When the Germans invaded Norway in 1940, teenager Odd Bjerke bid his family farewell and confidently made his way to Sweden alone, on skis, with the intention of traveling to Britain to fight for his country. His wartime journey would begin when he joined the Norwegian Free Army in Scotland in 1940. He would train troops in skiing and winter warfare in Iceland; then he was selected to go to the remote and barren island of Jan Mayen to help sustain the strategically important weather station there; and then back to Scotland where he would become a member of 5 Troop (Norwegian) No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando.

He and his comrade-in-arms were engaged in sabotage and underground resistance training missions in Norway and in combined operations in Lapland. His wartime service ended after he was severely wounded in the battle of Kapelsche Veer in Holland. Bjerke was rescued by resistance fighters and then hospitalized in Scotland before returning to Norway after the end of the war. . He would go on to a new, initially covert, life in America, drawing on his wartime experiences to train USAF crews in survival and evasion.

Based on his unpublished memoir, this book recounts the extraordinary adventures of a fearless Norwegian patriot.