The Complete Flying Officer X Stories

by H. E. Bates

Overview

At thirty-four, H.E. Bates was deemed too old for active service in WWII. But as a successful author, was commissioned by the nascent RAP Public Relations unit to publicise the bravery of the fighter pilots. Bates was posted to Oakington and Tangmere air bases where, over drinks with the pilots, he gathered their stories and wrote them as Flying Officer X.

The stories convey the pilots' personal qualities and the forces that motivated them. They blend the action and suspense of aerial battles, the tragedy of friendships cut off too soon, and life enduring against all odds.

Collected into one volume for the first time, along with five previously unpublished stories from the era, this is a remarkable collection.

Includes an introduction by Patrick Bishop, bestselling author of Bomber Boys: Fighting Back 1940-1945

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781448217366
Publisher:	Bloomsbury USA
Publication date:	06/14/2018
Pages:	246
Product dimensions:	6.02(w) x 9.25(h) x 0.56(d)

About the Author

H. E. Bates was born in 1905 in the shoe-making town of Rushden, Northamptonshire, and educated at Kettering Grammar School. After leaving school, he worked as a reporter and as a clerk in a leather warehouse. Many of his stories depict life in the rural Midlands, particularly his native Northamptonshire, where he spent many hours wandering the countryside.

His first novel, The Two Sisters (1926) was published by Jonathan Cape when he was just twenty. Many critically acclaimed novels and collections of short stories followed. During WWII he was commissioned into the RAF solely to write short stories, which were published under the pseudonym 'Flying Officer X'. His first financial success was Fair Stood the Wind for France (1944), followed by two novels about Burma, The Purple Plain (1947) and The Jacaranda Tree (1949) and one set in India, The Scarlet Sword (1950). Other well-known novels include Love for Lydia (1952) and The Feast of July (1954).

His most popular creation was the Larkin family which featured in five novels beginning with The Darling Buds of May in 1958. The later television adaptation was a huge success. Many other stories were adapted for the screen, the most renowned being The Purple Plain (1947) starring Gregory Peck, and The Triple Echo (1970) with Glenda Jackson and Oliver Reed.

H. E. Bates married in 1931, had four children and lived most of his life in a converted granary near Charing in Kent. He was awarded the CBE in 1973, shortly before his death in 1974.

Table of Contents

A Note from the Family

Foreword by Patrick Bishop

It's Never in the Papers

There's No Future in It

The Young Man from Kalgoorlie

It's Just the Way It Is

The Sun Rises Twice

No Trouble at All

A Personal War

K for Kitty

The Greatest People in the World

MacIntyre's Magna Charta

The Beginning of Things

Li Tale

The Disinherited

Sorry, No Saccharine

Sergeant Carmichael

O'Callaghan's Girl

Yours Is the Earth

Morning Victory

Free Choice, Free World

Here We Go Again

There's Something in the Air

How Sleep the Brave

Croix de Guerre

Additional Stories

Fishers

Happy Christmas Nastashya

The Bell

From This Time Forward

The Three Thousand and One Hours of Sergeant Kostek

Glossary of R.A.F. Slang

A Note on the Author

Editorial Reviews

A picture of the bomber pilot as near to the truth as we on the outside are likely to get” —New Statesman

“No other book on the British flier-or any other flier for that matter-has the sharp, authentic note Flying Officer Bates has written into his work … If there were decorations for this sort of thing, H. E. Bates would have the highest” —New York Times

“His material is, of course, magnificent, and he makes very moving use of it” —Spectator

From the Publisher