Burning Blue

James Holland is an internationally acclaimed and award-winning historian, writer, and broadcaster. The author of a number of best-selling histories including most recently The Savage Storm and Cassino '44, he is also the author of ten works of fiction and a dozen Ladybird Experts.He is the co-founder of the annual Chalke Valley History Festival which is now in its twelfth year, and he has presented - and written - many television programmes and series for the BBC, Channel 4, National Geographic and the History and Discovery channels. With Al Murray, he has a successful Second World War podcast, We Have Ways of Making You Talk, which also has its own festival, and is a research fellow at St Andrew's University and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. He can be found on Twitter as @James1940 and on Instagram as @jamesholland1940.

"This beautifully written book is a work of exceptional authenticity. The descriptions of life in the late 1930s and the intensity of the air battles revive many recollections and make for compelling reading." -- Geoffrey Wellum, former Battle of Britain pilot and author of First Light "Full of wartime atmosphere. Once again I could see the vapour trails, hear the Spitfire engines and the lofty crackle of machine guns" -- Leslie Thomas, author of Waiting for the Day "The ear-popping action sequences are tremendously exciting ... the pastoral scenes reveal a deep and genuine love of the countryside and its age-old traditions. Holland leaves one in no doubt what ordinary British folk were fighting for" Sunday Telegraph "There can seldom have been a better, nor more detailed, evocation of exactly what it was like to fly - and die - in the clear blue skies above the English Channel in those heady days in the summer and autumn of 1940" Daily Mail "He has joined the few who can bring history to life" Guardian