You Never Said Goodbye

One morning, sixteen-year-old John McArdle's father went to work and never came back. Struck down prematurely by a fatal heart attack, the forty-eight-year-old professional soldier left behind a wife and five children to grieve his death.

Now, more than five decades later, award-winning actor John McArdle writes a tender and moving letter to his father that provides an intimate portrait of the impact of his father's death, how he tried to cope, and how he turned his wild adventures abroad into a successful acting career.

A teenager in Liverpool during the "swinging sixties," McArdle turned to drugs and alcohol to numb his sadness and provide the illusion that he was experiencing life. As a child, his family had followed his father around the world, so young McArdle decided to go abroad once more and immigrate to Australia.

While in Oz, McArdle worked in the bush, went to a remote island to dodge the draft, and spent time in a New Zealand prison for stowing away on a ship. After five years, he decided to return to England-this time with a wife and baby in tow-and finally fulfill his dream of becoming a professional actor...