Undaunted

‘Diving was a boys-own adventure, a jump into the unknown full of devil-may-care attitudes. It welcomed you with one hand and cast you asunder with the other. It was a hideous bitch goddess and it drank the blood of the unprepared.’

Since his low-key upbringing, Hugh ‘Obi’ O’Brien’s life has been a wild ride. What led this country boy, one of four sporty sons, from Sydney boarding school to directionless youth to navy clearance diver – slipping undetected through deep waters to defuse mines and dismantle bombs? Then, upping the adrenaline, Obi joined the mysterious Special Forces counterterrorism unit TAG (East) – no walk in the park.

In his memoir Undaunted – full of eye-popping anecdotes and sparing the reader nothing of his persistent self-doubt – he recounts this incredible journey. He also describes the difficult transition from military life – to his days risking ‘spaghettification’ on underwater construction projects then private security work pirate-hunting in the Red Sea and tearing along the world’s most dangerous roads in the Middle East.

If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to follow a high-action alternative route through life, Obi makes a unique guide. Undaunted is an engaging and unexpected account by an operator at once tough, whimsical and funny and always brutally honest.