Love, Death, Chariot of Fire

(Paperback)

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

Reg Mitchell is a modest, decent man with a gift for designing fast aeroplanes. Two horrors seek him out terminal illness, and Nazi Germany's predicted invasion of his country. His response will change the course of world history.

Click here to watch Winton Higgins in conversation with Noelle Janaczewskaon the gleebooks YouTube channel.

'Here is a splendid love story of maker for machine: an inventor's single-minded devotion to his imperilled country, and to the fighter plane that he hopes will save it. Winton Higgins handles the origin story of the Spitfire with the surefootedness of the historian, and eloquence of the poet. His drama of creation is made all the more poignant by its backdrop of destruction: the collective destruction of war, and the personal destruction of the cancer that Mitchell attempts to outpace just long enough to get the job done.' Sara Knox, author of The Orphan Gunner

'If you love aeroplanes and even if you don't this book is a must. There is a saying among pilots 'if it looks good it will fly well' and there can be no better example than the Supermarine Spitfire, the graceful and deadly British superhero of World War II. The Spitfire evolved into a fighter plane that could out-climb, out-run, out-turn and out-fight anything in the sky. Pilots didn't like the Spitfire, they loved it. Winton Higgins has written a fluent and brilliantly researched story of the Spitfire's designer Reg Mitchell, and the creation of a unique classic aircraft. Spellbinding!' Peter Grose, author of A Good Place to Hide

Clickhereto listen to an interview between Ramsay Margolis and Winton Higgins discussing the book.

Reviews

"This dramatic story of the human feeling and frailty behind the legendary aircraft is told with imagination and compassion." - Sydney Morning Herald 22 August 2020
"If you love aeroplanes and even if you don't this book is a must. There is a saying among pilots 'if it looks good it will fly well and there can be no better example than the Supermarine Spitfire, the graceful and deadly British superhero of World War II. The Spitfire evolved into a fighter plane that could out-climb, out-run, out-turn and out-fight anything in the sky. Pilots didnt like the Spitfire, they loved it. Winton Higgins has written a fluent and brilliantly researched story of the Spitfires designer Reg Mitchell, and the creation of a unique classic aircraft. Spellbinding." - Peter Grose was a foreign correspondent for the New York Times and an executive editor of Foreign Affairs and served in the Carter administration. He is the author of four best-selling history books. He is also the proud holder of British, American and Australian private pilots licences, and has flown all over Australia, Europe and the United States in single-engine aircraft. He lives in France.

Author Bio

Winton Higgins is a writer and academic. He was born in Sydney in 1941 and holds degrees from the Universities of London, Stockholm and Sydney. After a brief period at the NSW Bar he changed careers to research, write and teach in the social sciences, first at Macquarie University, then the University of Technology Sydney. He has taught genocide studies at both, and sat on the board of the Australian Institute of Holocaust and Genocide Studies for two decades. As a creative writer he won the 2002 NSW Writers Centres short story competition, and in 2003 published his Holocaust-themed travel diary, Journey into Darkness. In 2016 he published Rule of Law, an historical novel about the first Nuremberg trial. He lives in Sydney with his partner; they have two daughters and three grandchildren.