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The Sky Is not Enough

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The Sky Is not Enough

By: June O'Sullivan
Narrated by: Jacqueline Milne
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About this listen

In 1928, Sophie Peirce-Evans marries Sir James Heath. With her new titled status as Lady Heath, she embarks on her most daring adventure: 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, a childhood shaped by repression and loss.

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, fame cannot free Sophie from her past. She has conquered the skies but not the shadows that follow ...

©2026 June O’Sullivan (P)2026 Bolinda Publishing Action & Adventure Historical Fiction Aviation

Critic reviews

'Propulsive storytelling – its momentum and verve powers it along.' (Martina Devlin, author of Charlotte)
'A splendid and soaring historical novel from a writer of rare gifts.' (Joseph O'Connor, bestselling author of Star of the Sea)
All stars
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It was amazing, all of it. The whole story was written and narrated wonderfully.
I grew up in the locality in which this story originated and had never heard of Sophie Pierce. It had me enthralled with each chapter.
So wonderfully composed and beautifully narrated!

A brilliantly narrated story!

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