In 1930 Mary Bruce became the first person to fly from the UK to Japan. But she nearly didn’t make it, when an oil leak over the Gulf of Oman brings her biplane tumbling down into an Iranian desert. Biographer Nancy Wilson describes how the ‘Queen of Speed’ was slowed.

Though strangely forgotten now, between the two World Wars Mary Petre Bruce set countless records in motoring, boat and aviation races. In her new biography, ‘Queen of Speed’, Nancy R Wilson tells how Mrs Bruce became the first woman to complete the Monte Carlo Rally.