A fearless Irish aviator battles sky and past
Based on the true story of Lady Mary Heath, this historical novel follows Sophie Peirce-Evans as she attempts a solo biplane flight from Cape Town to London in 1928. As danger mounts, so do the memories she cannot outrun.
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The Sky Is Not Enough
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A fearless Irish aviator battles sky and past
Based on the true story of Lady Mary Heath, this historical novel follows Sophie Peirce-Evans as she attempts a solo biplane flight from Cape Town to London in 1928. As danger mounts, so do the memories she cannot outrun.
- Book Synopsis
-
In 1928, Sophie Peirce-Evans marries Sir James Heath. With her new titled status as Lady Heath, she embarks on her most daring adventure yet: a solo flight in a biplane from Cape Town to London. Already a trailblazer – a world-record athlete, Britain’s first woman to parachute from a plane and first to earn a commercial pilot’s license – she is determined to prove that women belong in aviation and to showcase the potential of an aviation route from the colonies.
Fiercely independent, Sophie charts her 10,000-mile route using
pages from a road atlas, services her own aircraft, and defies
every restriction placed on women.
But as she soars over the vast continent memories from a traumatic past resurface: her mother murdered, her father imprisoned in an Irish asylum, and a childhood shaped by repression and loss.
Having been stricken with sunstroke, crash-landing in the wilderness and nursed by local women, thwarted at every turn by the authorities and ultimately seeking help from Mussolini, she finally lands in
London – heels, furs and all.
Though celebrated, Sophie realises fame cannot free her from her past. She has conquered the skies but not the shadows that follow.
- Product Details
-
- ISBN
- 9781781996539
- Format
- Paperback
- Publisher
- Poolbeg Press, (19 January 2026)
- Number of Pages
- 450
- Language
- English
- Categories: