adult-life adventure adventures adventurous adversity aerial-combat aerial-warfare africa african-safari air-combat air-force airplane airplanes ambition army author auto-biography autobiographical autobiography aviation aviator beloved-books biographical biography boarding-house boarding-school bomber-command bombers bombing brave bravery british british-air-force british-author british-culture british-empire british-literature british-society challenges childhood childhood-dreams childhood-memories childhoood childrens-literature chocolate classic colonialism coming-of-age courage courageous cows creativity danger daring desert determination dreams east-africa egypt england english 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 imperialism independence independent india inspiration inspiring journey kenya life-changing life-experiences life-lessons literary literature london longing mediterranean memoir memories middle-east military military-service mischief mischievous mombasa non-fiction nonfiction norway norwegian norwegian-heritage nostalgia 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-hornchurch raf-pilot raf-training real-life-stories recollections resilience risk roald-dahl royal-air-force royal-flying-corps royal-navy safari scandinavian second-world-war self-discovery social-commentary solitary solo solo-flight solo-flying solo-travel south-africa south-america spies spy spy-stories storytelling success sudan survival syria tales tanganyika tanzania tragedy transformation travel triumph true-story unconventional unique 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 young-readers youth