In her second novel, Polson writer and pilot C. Margo Mowbray fuses two passions – flying and World War II history – in a story that traces the treacherous route the Seventh Ferrying Group flew from Great Falls to Alaska, as they supplied the Russians with planes and war materiel. Mowbray’s 1,200 hours in the pilot’s seat are reflected in her sure descriptions of harrowing flights in sub-zero temperatures.
Her story brings together a motivated and accomplished young pilot who navigates whatever plane he’s assigned “over ice as old as rocks and mountains thrust a mile-and-a half high by a restless earth,” and a young ex-con from Butte, released from prison to work as a mechanic at the airfield in Great Falls. Their paths merge on one ill-fated flight, as each seeks his own brand of heroism.
It also discloses treachery sanctioned at the highest levels of government – giving the Stalin-led regime access to top-secret information that could have hastened the Soviet Union’s development of nuclear weapons.
Havoc Red marks Mowbray’s second work of historical fiction; An Answering Flame won the 2014 Media Award from the American College of Nurse-Midwives.
– Kristi Niemeyer