Worrals
Flight Officer Joan Worralson, better known as "Worrals", is a fictional character who is a member of the W.A.A.F. in the Second World War. She has a sidekick called Betty "Frecks" Lovell and was created by W. E. Johns, more famous for his series of books about Biggles. Johns modelled Worrals on two female aviators of his acquaintance, Amy Johnson—whom he knew as "Johnnie" Mollison, from which Worrals' name is presumed to derive—and Pauline Gower.
Novels
- Worrals of the W.A.A.F. (1941)
- Worrals Carries On (1942)
- Worrals Flies Again (1942)
- Worrals on the Warpath (1943)
- Worrals Goes East (1944)
- Worrals of the Islands (1945)
- Worrals in the Wilds (1947)
- Worrals Down Under (1948)
- Worrals Goes Afoot (1949)
- Worrals in the Wastelands (1949)
- Worrals Investigates (1950)
Short Stories
- Comrades in Arms (1946/7)
Other media
- In Alan Moore's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier, MI5 picked her to lead an incarnation of the League as replacement for deserter Mina Murray, as well as to draw female attention to the military. 'Frecks' is implied to be more than a sidekick, and she rebuffs the advances from William Samson, Jr., the Wolf of Kabul. Worrals's League is finally dissolved after their first mission ends in catastrophic failure.
Further reading
- Edwards, Owen Dudley, "The Battle of Britain and Children's Literature" in Paul Addison & Jeremy A. Crang (eds), The Burning Blue: a new history of the Battle of Britain. London: Pimlico, 2000. ISBN 0712664750
- Edwards, Owen Dudley, British Children's Fiction of the Second World War. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007. ISBN 0748616519