Captain de Havilland's Moth

'A wonderfully affecting, highly entertaining, at times elegiac account of a legendary aircraft, and the colourful and courageous men and women who flew her' John Nichol
The most iconic of all light aircraft, the DH60 Moth was the brain-child of Geoffrey de Havilland, visionary son of an angry and disappointed Victorian clergyman. A successful designer of military aircraft, Geoffrey dreamed of doing for aircraft what Ford had done for cars.
The emergence of his Moth in February 1925 marked the beginning of an important but neglected episode in British social history - the craze for flying which gripped a war-weary world for more than a decade. The most successful aircraft of its era, the Moth was the one in which people had the greatest adventures. And it was the Moth which showed that flying was safe, practical and, potentially, open to all.
'A joy... Every chapter is chock full of extraordinary people, evocative places and often jaw-dropping adventures' Rowland White
'Norman's thoroughly compelling history delivers scrapes and soarings in equal, diverting measure' New Statesman

Alexander Norman was a professional soldier, before taking a degree at Oxford University. He has written and co-written a number of top ten bestsellers, including Gurkha, with Colour-Sergeant Kailash Limbu. He also collaborated with the Dalai Lama on his autobiography, Freedom in Exile. An experienced Moth pilot himself, Alexander Norman's family was at the centre of the Moth craze between the wars. His grandfather, a great-aunt, two great-uncles and, subsequently, his father and two uncles were all Moth owners.