- Based on personal letters, diaries, sketches and photographs, all previously unpublished
- Charts Bob Keddie’s progression through every stage of RAF training during the Battle of Britain to his command of a Catalina flying boat, the revered ‘aristocrat of the skies’, at RAF Sullom Voe in the Shetlands
- Beautifully written, deeply personal letters, full of humour, innocence and understated courage
- Endorsed by a host of famous writers, journalists and military officers, including Richard Dawkins, Nick Hewer, Hugh Pym and General Sir Jack Deverell
Twenty-five-year-old Bob Keddie died on 16 May 1942 when his Catalina flying boat disappeared over the Norwegian Sea. He had been on a reconnaissance patrol for the protection of convoys carrying vital supplies to the Russians. No trace of him, his nine crew members, or his aircraft was ever found.
For Diana, his young wife who was four months pregnant, the disappearance brought an abrupt and agonising end to a two-year love story, innocent and intense, played out mostly in letters overflowing with tenderness and anticipation for a future free of war.
We’ve All Life Before Us tells Bob and Diana’s tragic but heartwarming story in their own words.
| BOOK ISBN |
9781781559604 |
| FORMAT |
234 x 156 mm |
| BINDING |
Hardback |
| PAGES |
208 pages |
| PUBLICATION DATE |
March 2025
|
| TERRITORY |
World |
| ILLUSTRATIONS |
37 photographs and 25 sketches |
Caroline Cecil Bose grew up in Essex, moving to London after studying economics at Bristol University. She has spent her career in marketing and communications and was on the board of a large communications company before setting up her own successful consultancy more than thirty years ago. She is a keen allotment gardener, walker and avid follower of tennis and showjumping. She lives in London with her husband, author Mihir Bose, whom she met at the Reform Club. Her uncle, a decorated pilot, first piqued her interest in the Second World War.
