adult-life adventure adventures adventurous adversity aerial-combat aerial-warfare africa african-safari air-force airplane airplanes ambition anecdotes army author auto-biography autobiographical autobiography aviation aviator beloved-books biographical biography boarding-house boarding-school bomber-command bombers brave bravery britain british british-air-force british-author british-culture british-empire british-history british-literature british-society captivating career challenges childhood childhood-dreams childhood-experiences childhood-memories childhoood childrens-literature classic colonialism coming-of-age comradeship courage courageous creativity crete danger danish daring desert determination dreams east-africa egypt engineer england entertaining escapades escape escapism excitement exploration family famous-authors fighter-pilot fighter-planes flying flying-ace flying-tigers friendship friendships funny german going-solo greece growing-up growth heartwarming heroism historical history hitchhiking humor humorous iconic imagination independence independent india inspiration journey kenya life-changing life-experiences life-lessons literary literature london loneliness longing mediterranean memoir memories middle-east military military-service mischief mischievous mombasa non-fiction nonfiction norway norwegian norwegian-heritage nostalgia novel occupation overcoming-fear p-40-curtiss-tomahawk p-40-tomahawk parents passion perseverance personal-growth pilot pilot-training piloting pilots plane-crashes planes prolific-author raf raf-pilot raf-training resilience risk roald-dahl royal-navy safari scandinavian second-world-war self-discovery social-commentary solitary solo solo-flying solo-travel south-africa south-america spies spitfire spy spy-stories storytelling success sudan survival syria tales tanganyika tanzania tragedy transformation travel triumph true-story unconventional unique victory vivid-storytelling wanderlust war war-experience war-experiences war-memoir war-stories wartime wartime-experience wartime-experiences wartime-pilot wild-imagination wit world-war world-war-ii writer writing wwii young-adult youth