About the Norwegian book
The book was written between March 2009 and May 2009. One year of writing. The book is based on Finns own memoars and some of these have been put into the book in quotes. Research has been done via interviews with veterans, Finns widow Gurli Thorsager and his daughter Ellen. 332's own ORB from the war has also been of great help. In the memoars which was written in 1993-1993 Finn tells about several undated events over the continent and in England.
It's been my job to find these missions and the events he's talking about in the ORB and checking these up to his memoars for historical accuracy. Most of the times, I have managed to track down the events that Finn is writing about. I remember one about a mission to France as escort to American Forts. He writes in his memoars that the squadron started at a specific time. I tracked it down to a certain month, but could not find the right time of take off, as none of the missions in 1943 started at that specific time. I had to assume that the mission started five minutes later than what Finn said in his memoars! This is a good example of the level of detail I'm digging into, as I want to create a correct picture of the events happening. Through these sources it's been possible to do.
The pictures in the book has been collected from Finns own photo albums, as well as Wilhelm Mohrs amazing collection of pictures from his time with 332 squadron. In addition to that, Tore Erling Larsen has been doing a few illsutrations as well. He has among other things painted Finn for the cover of the Norwegian version.
A few people has asked me about Finns aerial victories. How many Germans he shot down and so on. I have deliberately stayed away from putting any focus on this. Finn was not the type of character that took any pride, or talked about his victories.
In most historic books you will see that he is credited with one German shot down during the 9th of April 1940. This is the Heinkel 111 he shot at on his second mission. Finn had several engagements during his time with 332, especially during the Dieppe raid. Finn however, was more reluctant to claim victories than most others. He did however claim a few, and told a reported in 1995 that he did indeed shoot down a FW190, seeing it go spinning towards the Earth. However, officially he stands with the one Heinkel 111 and a few shared and proopables. These records are not correct IMO, as Finn obviously did shoot down more. But like I said, this is not the point of the book or anything to focus on. I do understand the question though. Finn was not the type for such talk, and out of respect for him, I'm keeping it that way :)
Tor Idar Larsen