For Whom The Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway

Rating 3.5 ⭐s

You can buy For Whom The Bell Tolls....here

• The Blurb...

Immerse yourself in the poignant and powerful world of war with Ernest Hemingway's timeless novel, "For Whom the Bell Tolls." Set against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War, this gripping narrative delves into themes of love, sacrifice, and the stark realities of conflict.

As the story unfolds, follow Robert Jordan, an American dynamiter, who is tasked with blowing up a bridge to aid the Republican cause. What drives a man to risk everything for a cause greater than himself? Hemingway's masterful prose invites you to explore the complexities of loyalty, honor, and the bonds forged in the crucible of war.

But here’s the question that lingers: In a world marked by chaos and uncertainty, what does it truly mean to be human? As Robert grapples with his mission, he encounters a cast of unforgettable characters, each struggling with their own demons, hopes, and dreams. The haunting realities of war blur the lines between good and evil, challenging perceptions and provoking deep introspection.

Experience Hemingway's exquisite writing style as he paints a vivid picture of love amid the horrors of battle. The evocative imagery and rich character development create a reading experience that resonates long after the last page is turned.

• Our Review...

For Whom The Bell Tolls (FWTBT) follows Robert Jordan an American demolition expert over several intense days in the Spanish Civil War. Jordan is fighting on the side of the Republicans and is tasked with blowing up a bridge behind enemy lines before a forthcoming offensive. However he needs the help of the local Guerilla fighters led by the experienced, surly Pablo, his robust and capable woman Pilar, Maria a young women suffering PTSD from being sexually abused by the fascists. and a cast of other fighters. Encouraged by Pilar, Jordan and Maria fall madly in love during the intense prep for the demolition of the bridge. All the while Pablo is becoming more withdrawn, knowing full well the Fascists retribution will destroy his small happy band who had been enjoying the war in a sleepy little backwater.

I chose to read this book because I had seen two very prophetic Hemingway quotes about "listening" and "darkest moments" (I will put them at the end of the review after about the author) I thought that both both were accurate and insightful facets of what it is to be human. The style clear and concise. 

While I enjoyed the book, I felt the signature conciseness and clarity was lost with the archaic use of thee and thou in the dialogue. It drew the reader out of the story..

The characters of Pablo and Pilar are very interesting. Pablo is an instinctive, ruthless tactician and killer who has lost his hunger for the fight and now just wants to survive and enjoy his freedom and beloved horses. He battles within himself to decide whether his longing for life in obscurity is enough to tip the balance to betray Jordan and his former republican idealism. While Pilar is the experienced, bullish woman of the world. Lover of a semi famous bull fighter back in the day. She still believes in what they are fighting for even though she has seen atrocities committed by both sides. She acts as a mother figure and matchmaker for the troubled young girl Maria. She tries to help Pablo keep the faith in what they used to believe but she knows she is fighting a losing battle. In addition she acts as facilitator to ensure Jordan's mission is successful. She is the hero of the narrative just as much as Jordan. 

The section where Pilar describes surrounding her home village courthouse and dragging the fascists out one by one to be murdered in various ways and thrown from the cliff to be very harrowing. These fascists once being her friends and neighbours. It put me in mind of a war between say Brexiteers and Remainers in UK. It would be horrific. Civil War is in reality the least civil war. It may be my imagination but this felt as if this part of the story had the ring of truth about it. Hemingway was a journalist and was in Spain at the time. Who knows what tales he picked up with his ear to the ground.. 

The narrative deals with all the big juicy stuff of life...Love, honour, duty, death, politics, corruption, right and wrong. All the stuff I look for in a novel. I think I will read more Hemingway. Probably his short stories. 

As an aside I read The Secret Hours by Mick Heron in parallel with FWTBT. While FWTBT is very "American" eg the handsome American faces overwhelming odds and gets the girl. I suppose what you would call an All American hero. 

The Secret Hours is all cynicism, sarcasm and sniping from the side, which adds flavour. I know I'm comparing different genres from different times. But at the time it struck as good example of the difference in UK v USA writing.

• Selected Quotes...

So if you love this girl as much as you say you do, you had better love her very hard and make up in intensity what the relation will lack in duration and in continuity.

Your nationality and your politics did not show when you were dead.

How could the ‘Inglés’ say that the shooting of a man is like the shooting of an animal? In all hunting I have had an elation and no feeling of wrong. But to shoot a man gives a feeling as though one had struck one’s own brother when you are grown men.

Dying is only bad when it takes a long time and hurts so much that it humiliates you.

• If You Liked This Then You May Like.

Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell

The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane

Rope Burns by FX Toole

• About The Author....

Ernest Hemingway was born in 1899. His father was a doctor and he was the second of six children. Their home was at Oak Park, a Chicago suburb.

In 1917, Hemingway joined the Kansas City Star as a cub reporter. The following year, he volunteered as an ambulance driver on the Italian front, where he was badly wounded but decorated for his services. He returned to America in 1919, and married in 1921. In 1922, he reported on the Greco-Turkish war before resigning from journalism to devote himself to fiction. He settled in Paris where he renewed his earlier friendships with such fellow-American expatriates as Ezra Pound and Gertrude Stein. Their encouragement and criticism were to play a valuable part in the formation of his style.

Hemingway's first two published works were Three Stories and Ten Poems and In Our Time but it was the satirical novel, The Torrents of Spring, that established his name more widely. His international reputation was firmly secured by his next three books; Fiesta, Men Without Women and A Farewell to Arms.

He was passionately involved with bullfighting, big-game hunting and deep-sea fishing and his writing reflected this. He visited Spain during the Civil War and described his experiences in the bestseller, For Whom the Bell Tolls.

His direct and deceptively simple style of writing spawned generations of imitators but no equals. Recognition of his position in contemporary literature came in 1954 when he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, following the publication of The Old Man and the Sea. He died in 1961.

Hemmingway Quotes....

When people talk listen completely. Don’t be thinking what you’re going to say. Most people never listen. Nor do they observe. You should be able to go into a room and when you come out know everything that you saw there and not only that. If that room gave you any feeling you should know exactly what it was that gave you that feeling.

In our darkest moments, we don’t need solutions or advice. What we yearn for is simply human connection—a quiet presence, a gentle touch. These small gestures are the anchors that hold us steady when life feels like too much.
Please don’t try to fix me. Don’t take on my pain or push away my shadows. Just sit beside me as I work through my own inner storms. Be the steady hand I can reach for as I find my way.
My pain is mine to carry, my battles mine to face. But your presence reminds me I’m not alone in this vast, sometimes frightening world. It’s a quiet reminder that I am worthy of love, even when I feel broken.
So, in those dark hours when I lose my way, will you just be here? Not as a rescuer, but as a companion. Hold my hand until the dawn arrives, helping me remember my strength.
Your silent support is the most precious gift you can give. It’s a love that helps me remember who I am, even when I forget.”

The Gathering Storm by Alan Jones

 

Rating 5⭐s

You can buy The Gathering Storm..here

You can find out more about Alan Jones...here

The Blurb...

The Gathering Storm: Book 1 in the Sturmtaucher Trilogy, a powerful and compelling story of two families torn apart by evil.

Kiel, Northern Germany, 1933. A naval city, the base for the German Baltic fleet, and the centre for German sailing, the venue for the upcoming Olympic regatta in 1936.

The Kästners, a prominent Military family, are part of the fabric of the city, and its social, naval and yachting circles. The Nussbaums are the second generation of their family to be in service with the Kästners as domestic staff, but the two households have a closer bond than most.

As Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist Party claw their way to power in 1933, life has never looked better for families like the Kästners. There is only one problem.

The Nussbaums are Jews.

The Sturmtaucher Trilogy documents the devastating effect on both families of the Nazis’ hateful ideology and the insidious erosion of the rights of Germany's Jews.

When Germany descends ever deeper into dictatorship, General Erich Kästner tries desperately to protect his employees, and to spirit them to safety.

As the country tears itself apart, the darkness which envelops a nation threatens not only to destroy two families, but to plunge an entire continent into war.’

Our Review...

This is a heart rending cautionary tale of politics gone wrong. It tells the tale of Eric (played in my head by Curt Jurgens!) and Yosef. Childhood friends who saw out the first world war in action together. Now Erich is a General working for German military intelligence and Yosef is his domestic help/driver. However its 1933 in Kiel. Yosef and his family are jewish but not fervently so. This is the first part of a trilogy that encompasses 1933-1945 in total.

We meet both sets of families. Erich's two sons progress from the compulsory Hitler Youth into the Army. Franz honourable and thoughtful like his father, Johann a womanising hot head. We also meet Erich's wife Maria, desperate to be a leading socialite and accepted by the aristocracy. To this end she is seeking a high society match for her oldest daughter.

Yosef's family is less aspirational. His wife is the Kastner's cook. They along with their children live with them in a small servants house on the Kastner's estate.

So now the scene is set we follow the slow, inexorable rising tide of the nazi party.  With each new law, diktat and convention the pressure builds a little more. Step by small step the tension continually ramps up. until it is unbearable. Yosef's family's freedoms and rights are eroded, the thugs both in brown/black shirts and in civilian garb get a little louder and a little closer. How can Yosef protect them without being taken to the camps as a criminal. What can Erich do with being denounced as a traitor. 

This is in part a epistolary novel. The writer is very clever in using telegrams between military intelligence departments and letters between Jewish friends to increase the temperature without telling you that he is increasing the temperature dial. 

Often you see two questions posed about WW2 and the nazis. 

1. How did the German people just go along with the race hatred policies of the nazis?

2. Why didn't the Jewish population do something about it?

If you read this book, it transfers into you by osmosis into the feel of the time and place, you will understand how both these situations occurred. And it is truly horrific and a scenario that one can see playing out around us in populist politics today. 

Any negative things about this book? It felt heavy, serious and important. Although given the subject matter there was no way around this. It was never going to be rainbows and lollipops although perhaps it could have been a little shorter.

However this does not deflect from an excellent book. You really feel for the characters and it's heartbreaking that you now whats coming while they don't.

Like being with a friend who you know has a terminal illness but he is oblivious to it.. This book should be studied in schools in History or English classes to see how media manipulation can lead to societal control. Read this as history and then read 1984 to see the next evolution. 

The research is amazing and the reader would do well to read the appendages to appreciate this mammoth 5 year undertaking.

This is a tour de force and I can give it no higher praise than to say it could be a "Schindler's List" prequel.

Selected Quotes...

The thing is, Yosef, people are disillusioned. Unemployment is soaring, living conditions are worse than ever and our politicians are indecisive and do nothing but bicker and prevaricate. We are being bled dry and treated as pariahs by the rest of the world and our armed forces are emasculated. Is it any wonder that people see him as some sort of saviour?’

We went from a democracy to a dictatorship in a few short months, without so much as a whimper.’ ‘Because deep down, the German people don’t really like us, and if we’re the price they pay for putting Germany back on the world stage, they’ll give him anything.’

He paused again, looking around at the faces of people desperate for guidance, both temporal and spiritual. ‘I am leaving Germany with reluctance because, until recently, I regarded myself as German, and I loved this country. If it were just our leaders who were trying to impose their anti-Semitic views on the nation, I could live with that. But the German people; not all of them, but a significant proportion of them, are embracing those views and, in my view, it can only get worse.’

She gave him a worried smile. ‘You too? It’s getting to the stage when I think everyone is looking at me.’ ‘Maybe we’re just overthinking it all. Surely everyone hasn’t become Jew-haters overnight?’ ‘Maybe they’ve always hated us, but only now do they feel they can show it.’

the alcohol slowly glued the group together, and loosened their tongues,

wasn’t the National Socialists or the government who threw the bricks and lit the fires of Kristallnacht, although they stood back and let it happen. It was the German people who smashed and burned our homes, shops and synagogues.’

Memo: Geh.KdoS. ABW 31/08/39 CAC0842.1 For Attention Only: General Erich Kästner, Abwehr, Kiel office, Abwehr. From: Vice Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, Chef der Abwer

The British fleet has mobilised; all leave has been cancelled and all naval ships have been made ready to go to sea. [END]

If You Liked This, Then You May Like...

The Unwanted Dead by Chris Lloyd

The Nightingale by Kristen Hannah

Living With The Enemy by Jack Higgins

About the author...

Alan Jones is a Scottish author with three gritty crime stories to his name, the first two set in Glasgow, the third one based in London. He has now switched genres, and his WW2 trilogy was published in the second half of 2021. It is a Holocaust story set in Northern Germany.

He is married with four grown up children and six wonderful grandchildren.

He retired in 2020 as a mixed-practice vet in a small Scottish coastal town in Ayrshire and is one of the RNLI volunteer coxswains on the local lifeboat. He makes furniture in his spare time, and maintains and sails a 45-year-old yacht in the Irish Sea and on the beautiful west coast of Scotland. He loves reading, watching films and cooking. He still plays football despite being just the wrong side of sixty.

His crime novels are not for the faint-hearted, with some strong language, violence, and various degrees of sexual content. The first two books also contain a fair smattering of Glasgow slang.

He is one of the few self-published authors to be given a panel at Bloody Scotland and has done two pop-up book launches at the festival in Stirling.

He spent five years researching and writing the Sturmtaucher Trilogy.

In Memoriam by Alice Winn

This review is by guest reviewer...Rebecca Morgan 

Rating...5⭐

You can buy "In Memoriam"...Here

You can find out more about Alice Winn...Here

380 pages

• The Blurb...

In 1914, war feels far away to Henry Gaunt and Sidney Ellwood. They're too young to enlist, and anyway, Gaunt is fighting his own private battle - an all-consuming infatuation with the dreamy, poetic Ellwood - not having a clue that his best friend is in love with him, always has been.

When Gaunt's mother asks him to enlist in the British army to protect the family from anti-German attacks, he signs up immediately, relieved to escape his overwhelming feelings. But Ellwood and their classmates soon follow him into the horrors of the trenches. Though Ellwood and Gaunt find fleeting moments of solace in one another, their friends are dying in front of them, and at any moment they could be next.

• Our Review...

Written by Alice Winn as her “breakout” novel. Winner of the 2023 Waterstones debut fiction prize and 2023 Waterstones novel of the year. Both very well deserved IMO! Alice Winn has also done an evident amount of research into the time period and WW1 itself and started writing In Memoriam after reading school newspapers from this time. This book is written in a way that really pulls through a lot of emotions. I read it in a week (new baby slowing me down) as I couldn’t put it down. It covers topics such as homosexuality in a time that it was illegal to act on those feelings, set in a boarding school and a war too horrific to imagine. Thankfully, nothing that I can personally relate to. And yet… it was able to evoke genuine wide ranging emotion. One scene set at the battle of the Somme (that shouldn’t be a spoiler, it’s pretty well documented) made me genuinely stressed, feel anger, confusion and bewilderment. I’ve not connected to description like it before (I’m normally all for the conversational writing). Despite its deep and heavy topics, it also brings through comradery and a unique sense of understanding amongst peers both at the school and at the front. The bond between the boys/men prisoner of war camps and the change in men following their time at the front are also captured and conveyed with an almost ugly beauty. One of the novels strengths is the way Winn brings across emotions. There is a point where Ellwood is walking through town while on leave in England and is handed a white feather. The way it’s written and his decision to never walk in civvi clothes again is particularly well done. Also the scene with the Battle of the Somme (I know I mentioned it above but it’s unbelievably good writing) covered so many different emotions in that one moment. Her use of multiple characters perspective and the perspective of the opposition made the picture really full and left me with genuine feels of anticipation and impending dread. She was able to hold me in this space for, what felt like, an uncomfortably long time… needless to say, I took a break at the end of that chapter. The book is written primarily from the perspective of both the main characters, Sidney Ellwood and Henry Gaunt. Both of these characters are very contrasting and have different views of many things, including the war. Gaunt is partly German and Ellwood has a fantastical schoolboy view of glory. By doing this, Winn is not only able to cover several aspects and introduce more characters and relationships, but also able to draw parallels between expectations and reality. For example, the meaning taken in some of the letters from Gaunt to Ellwood from the front is missed until Ellwood is able to experience these things himself, “When Gaunt wrote that they were rotting, Ellwood had not understood - how could sand rot? But the bags weren’t filled with sand anymore…”. It also allows Winn to draw parallels between the impact the war has on such contrasting characters. One minor distraction form me was that throughout the book Ellwood draws on poetry and quotes this out loud, often based on situations that he is in. While this is very cleverly done and is a good way for him to articulate his feelings while remaining (somewhat) subtle, I myself found it difficult to connect at times. I have very limited prior experience

with poetry and therefore some of it could be lost on me but I did find some nks tenuous. Still think it’s very clever though!

• Selected Quote...

It was the Hell you’d feared in childhood, come to devour the children. It was treading over the corpses of your friends so that you might be killed yourself. It was the congealed evil of a century.

• If You Liked This Then You May Like...

Two Storm Wood by Philip Gray. Click here for our review

The Winter Soldier by Daniel Mason.

Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks

• About The Author...

Alice Winn is the author of In Memoriam. She grew up in Paris and was educated in the UK. She has a degree in English literature from Oxford University. She lives in Brooklyn.

Bomber by Len Deighton

 

Rating...4.5⭐

487 pages

You can buy Bomber...Here

You can find out more about Len Deighton...Here

• The Blurb...

31 June, 1943. An RAF crew prepare for their next bombing raid on Germany. It is a night that many will never forget. Len Deighton's devastating novel is a gripping minute-by-minute account of what happens over the next twenty-four hours

. Told through the eyes of ordinary people in the air and on the ground - from a young pilot to the inhabitants of a small town in the Ruhr - Bomber is an unforgettable portrayal of individuals caught up in the wreckage of war.

• Our Review...

This review is part of my 52 books in 52 weeks challenge. Details can be found here. The prompt for this week's book was a novel that was longlisted for the booker prize. This was nominated in 1970.

It's not often you get to review a novel that was the inspiration for a Motorhead Album. 

So this was written a mere 25 years after the second world war by an RAF veteran. Considering it is 54 years old it stands up remarkably well. It should be up there with "All Quiet On The Western Front" as anti war book. Not because it preaches a pacifist message, because it does not. It just shows what happens an a bombing raid and lets you draw your own conclusions.

The date (31st June 1943) and the town (Altgarten) are fictitious. Everything else is remarkably real. The research for this novel is gargantuan but not jarringly intrusive on the narrative. 

Deighton gives us 24hrs in the life of a British bombing raid. It is all encompassing. Much like a Tarantino film, we have an array of subtlety interlinking sub-plots from the war weary pilot, the Prussian aristocrat fighter pilot, the aging German radar command officer, his housekeeper, the burgo-master, and fire chief and numerous other characters. Given the vast cast, the author does an excellent job of keeping them separate in our minds. Each has their own issues and hopes. The English class system is quite prevalent here. 

The scale is epic. Given the grand backdrop, the author also does an excellent job of immersing in the day to day lives of the protagonists. The first third of the book is setting out the outline and characters. the second two thirds deal with the raid. This is when the tension ramps up. 

The raid itself features hundreds of bombers. We follow one in particular, nicknamed Creaking Door. The chaos and horrific deaths that ensue both within the British bomber crews and German fighters and just bog standard random people on the ground is immensely moving. We become invested in the people from both sides. I read on in the hope that certain characters make it through the night. It was a bit like the film Titanic in that you know its a disaster, but you just hope your favourites make it out alive. 

All that technical knowledge and heroism, all just to murder each other. If only if could harnessed for a worthwhile cause. 

On a personal note, I was drawn to this novel because my wife's grandfather (now sadly passed) was a P.O.W. His last Prisoner of War Camp, much like Kurt Vonnegut, was at Dresden which was obliterated by the allies towards the latter stages of the war. 1299 bombers dropped almost 4000tons of bombs killing 37,000 people. (for comparison roughly the same population as Port Talbot) He didn't talk about the war, but one day not long before he passed away he told me about it. That was 34 years ago and I've never forgotten. 

Many think the heavy bombing campaign should have been classed as a war crime and reading this novel you can see why. 

• Selected Quotes...

 "there’s no difference between bankrupting a foreign factory in peacetime and bombing it in wartime. Capitalism is competition and the ultimate form of that is war.”

“He’s always wiping his mouth and fingers,” said Beer. “He makes me feel like I’m suffering from some sort of contagious disease.”
“You are,” said Kokke. “It’s called poverty.”

the English believe that only gentlemen can be leaders”

It’s as though the plane goes to bomb Germany of its own predatory volition, as though it takes us along just for the ride”

you don’t believe in this war”  said Cohen “Believe in it? . . . you make it sound like a rumour.” Lambert replied.

• If You Liked This You May Like...

Hornet Flight by Ken Follet

Goshawk Squadron by Derek Robinson

Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut click to see our review here

• About The Author...

Len Deighton was born in Marylebone, London, in 1929. His father worked as a chauffeur and mechanic, while his mother was a part-time cook. After leaving school, Deighton took a job as a railway clerk before completing his National Service as a photographer for the Royal Air Force's Special Investigation Branch. Upon his discharge from the RAF, he attended St Martin's School of Art in London in 1949, and by 1952, he had secured a scholarship to the Royal College of Art, from which he graduated in 1955.

Deighton's career path led him to become an airline steward with BOAC. Prior to launching his writing career, he was an illustrator in New York and later, in 1960, an art director at a London advertising agency. He is recognized for designing the first British cover for Jack Kerouac's "On the Road" and later used his artistic talents to illustrate several of his military history books.

With the success of his early novels, Deighton took on the role of cookery writer for The Observer and created illustrated cookbooks. In September 1967, he penned an article for the Sunday Times Magazine about Operation Snowdrop—an SAS attack on Benghazi during World War II. The next year, David Stirling was awarded significant libel damages over the article.

Deighton also authored travel guides and served as the travel editor for Playboy before venturing into film production. He produced a film adaptation of his 1968 novel "Only When I Larf," and with photographer Brian Duffy, acquired the film rights to Joan Littlewood and Theatre Workshop's stage musical "Oh, What a Lovely War!" However, he chose to have his name removed from the film's credits, a decision he later regretted as "stupid and infantile." This marked his final foray into cinema.

In 1969, Deighton left England and briefly settled in Blackrock, County Louth, Ireland. He has seldom returned to England, save for personal visits and a handful of media appearances, the most recent being a 2006 interview that was part of a "Len Deighton Night" on BBC Four.

The LIghtning And The Few by Patrick Larsimont

 

302 pages

You can buy The Lightning And The Few....Here

You can buy the latest Patrick Larsimont novel The Maple & The Blue...Here 

• The Blurb...

Scotland, 1939

When Jox McNabb is expelled from school he is forced to look to his future.

Inspired by the sight of a Hurricane flying over him, he becomes determined to join the RAF.

And after basic training, Jox is posted to RAF Montrose with the growing group of other recruits he has met along the way.

Battling the bleak Scottish elements and finding themselves immediately thrown in at the deep end, the lads struggle to keep up with the training.

Many are deemed unfit for service, and after tragedy strikes, Jox questions if he’s got what it takes.

Can Jox earn his wings to face Blitzkrieg and defend his country in its hour of need? Does he have the courage and skill to become one of The Few?

Will he beat the odds to survive his first battle?

• Our Review...

The Lightning and the Few is a straight forward account of young Jox McNabb from his leaving public school in 1939, joining the RAF and becoming a fighter pilot during the Battle of Britain.

To say it is a straight forward narrative takes nothing away from the writing. Indeed after my last two reads (Blood Meridian and 11:22:63) it made for a refreshing change to not have to think about the complicated messages implied between the lines, obscure language of time paradoxes. Without these distractions I found my self becoming engrossed in our young protagonist's adventures.

It is similar to Titanic in a respect that you  already know what happens in the bigger picture but the interest is in wether the plucky pilot lives and indeed will his life, and love blossom into all it could be.

The tale is book-ended by some young modern day researchers from the Imperial War Museum who are digging up a downed WW2 fighter plane. This is a clever way to link the here and now to the past. More so when you see a deeper link between the two.

As enjoyable as this adrenaline, fighter pilot rush of a book is, I feel the book it is written with an inherant reverance or appreciation for the public school type establishment and Winston Churchill. This does not sit comfortably with me as old Etonians, have, in my view,  done  much damage financially to this country in this century as the Luftwaffe did in the last. And while Mr. Churchill has been air-brushed into his position as the greatest British Leader of all time, he isn't very popular with a large slice of the older generation in my neck of the words after turning the army loose on starving, striking miners in Tonypandy with the infamous phrase "If they are hungry we will fill their bellies full of lead." I think the upper class had more to lose during the war. As a working-class character in another recent WW2 book that I read remarks that all it would mean to him if the Germans were running the country was  that his taxes would go to Berlin rather London. I was in two minds about including this paragraph as it is more about me and my background rather than the very intersting book I was reading. However I did decide to include it in the end, as the aim of the blog is and remains to record my thoughts as I am immersed in the narrative. Of course my thoughts and feelings may be different to another reader. 

The above notwithstanding this is a well researched, interesting exciting novel. Written by a very capable author, who knows not to put to many distractive points into a great scenario and setting.

• Selected Quotes...

Most striking was the control stick, topped by a black padded ring with a large brass button at eleven o’clock, to fire the guns with pressure from the right thumb. It was like a golden nipple of doom.

They were Flying Officer David Bury from Carlisle, former head boy of Eton College, and Pilot Officer Ian Moorwood from Boscombe in Dorset. ‘David is … er, was a really close friend of mine,’ said Bruce, his voice catching. ‘What a bloody waste. He was so full of promise. Only last week, he and I cadged a lift to visit his father’s grave, Captain Edmond Bury of the King’s Royal Rifles, killed in France in 1915. He’s buried in Fleurbaix, 

Once settled into their cockpits, their chamois leather masks went straight on and the knobs were swiftly turned to release an invigorating blast of oxygen from their tanks. A few deep sniffs were just the thing to clear thick heads. It was a miracle how well it worked, and it wasn’t the first time they’d depended on this gaseous morning regimen. Officially frowned upon by the powers that be, it had pretty much become standard practice amongst fighter pilots who needed to let off steam after trying missions,

what Ferriss called ‘a half-decent Pouilly-Fumé’ served by the attentive sommelier cum airman. It was the best glass of wine Jox had ever tasted, second only to the ‘fine Bourgogne Aligoté’ they’d enjoyed earlier with their buttered potted shrimp. It appeared Ferriss knew his way around a wine list,

At school, Jox had been taught not to speak with his mouth full, but it wasn’t a lesson taught in the rough Dundee quarter where the Glasgow twins were from.

In reality, war is very boring. We do the same thing over and over again. We hurry, then wait long hours until we are suddenly faced by minutes of sheer terror, then go off and do it all over again. It’s so very dull and utterly exhausting, and yet is also the greatest endeavour of my life. We’ll never be more tested and will no doubt look back at this time as the best of our lives. It all seems so utterly pointless and a terrible waste.’

• If You Liked This Then You May Like...

Spitfire Pilot: A personal account of the Battle of Britain by David M Crook

Breaking Point: A novel of the Battle of Britain

Vengence of the Allies: A World War Two novel by Ethan Watts

• About The Author

Patrick worked in advertising for many years with some of the most globally recognised agencies and brands. He’d go as far as saying that he doubts there is anyone in the UK that hasn’t seen some of his work. Before that, he served in military intelligence, was educated in Scotland and now describes himself as a Dorset Highlander. He is the mixed heritage son of two diplomats and as a result has lived in over twenty countries around the world.

Patrick has always been fascinated by history, particularly military history, and spurred on by the time on his hands during two lockdowns, he took to writing stories. To date, he has completed two stand-alone supernatural historical novels, one about past lives and the other about the ghosts haunting a military cemetery. The latter was long-listed for the inaugural Morley Prize for unpublished authors of colour.

The Last Line by Stephen Ronson

 

341 pages

This book is not due out untill 2nd November 2023. 

You can pre order The Last Line...Here

• The Blurb...

May 1940.

With Nazi forces sweeping across France, invasion seems imminent. The English Channel has never felt so narrow.

In rural Sussex, war veteran John Cook has been tasked with preparing the resistance effort, should the worst happen.

But even as the foreign threat looms, it's rumours of a missing child that are troubling Cook. A twelve-year-old girl was evacuated from London and never seen again, and she's just the tip of the iceberg - countless evacuees haven't made it to their host families.

As Cook investigates, he uncovers a dark conspiracy that reaches to the highest ranks of society. He will do whatever it takes to make the culprits pay. There are some lines you just don't cross.

• Our Review...

John Cook, Sussex landowner and veteran of WW1 and Afghanistan tries to re-enlist for the new war. However given his history he is instead recruited to form a resistance cell, which is to become active after the Germans have invaded in a few weeks.

On his return from London a young girl is found murdered on his property. John is implicated and he begins his own investigations. What he finds horrifies him and he resovlves to fix the problem his way. All the while with one eye on the coast and recruiting a diverse band of feisty fighters.

Having recently read the excellent Paris Requiem by Chris Llloyd and the equally good Embassy Murders by Mark Ellis, I thought I was in for more of the same. Police procedural set in wartime europe. This book sort of started out like that but by the end it had pivoted at least twice into WW2 James Bond territoty and again into WW2 Jack Reacher territory. And what a belting idea to set Reacher in a WW2 setting. I even wrote in my notes (WW2 Reacher?) When I later checked other reviews, I saw others had been thinking along the same lines. Nice to know it's not just me going off on a tangent then. 

So it's a bit of a hybrid then. Much like a hybrid bike or car, the concept may seem odd until you get one yourself and then you realise the was a slot in the market for it all along, This was a very entertaining book in all aspects. The violence was well written ala Lee Child. However the bits I liked the most were the historic setting parts as can probably be seen by my choice of quotes (see below.) 

The auxillary (resistance) unit that Cook is asked to develop in his home area was a real thing. Having read the authors notes for Resisitance by Owen Sheers, I discovered that it also inspired that book. 

With the war in Ukraine it makes you stop and think what would I do? Would I fight? Would I just shrug my shoulders and instead of paying  tax  to HMRC it would go to Berlin (as one character in the book puts it). 

I thought the opening scene was paticularly well thought out and a bit different from the norm. In addition I like the rugged character of John Cook. I think I am roughly the same age as the author and grew up in 70s. There were some hard, quiet men in the village who were forged in the war. The like of which we dont see today. I dont know if thats a good thing or not. On the plus side it means we haven't needed men like that, men who can kill en mass for a long time because there hasn't been a major war since.

 I digress, back to the book. Although the high body count without police involvement means it as more of a step away from historical accuracy than the police procedurals that I have been reading, I found this to be an enjoyable adventure. It sort sits like Where Eagles Dare sits next to A Bridge Too Far. One is fantasy one is history but if you didn't know that both are equally enjoyable.

Look out Reacher.. John Cook is coming 

• Selected Quotes..

Uncle Nob didn’t do well in the last war. The Great War: always capitalised, always thick with meaning.

 ‘She’s grown up fast,’ he said, watching her. I knew what he meant. She was like one of those pictures they painted on the bombers in the newsreels, all curves and smiles and rosy cheeks.

‘You drink in these huge pubs where they bring you gallons of the stuff. You just sit there at your table while birds with their tits falling out of their shirts keep topping up your glass.’ He looked around at his own pub. No birds with tits falling out of their shirts. No revelry. I almost felt sorry for him. ‘Maybe the birds with the tits will follow behind the tanks,’

Let them come, I thought. Let them roll through my farm and my town. I’d surrender, and I’d say my ‘Heil Hitler’ along with everyone else. I’d survive and I’d make sure my family survived. And then, when their generals had gone back to Bavaria to plan the invasion of Russia, I’d be ready. Ready to do my bit. Ready to get the job done.

• If You Liked This Then You May Like..

Resistance by Owen Sheers

Fatherland by Richard Harris

SSGB by Len Deighton

The Embassy Murders by Mark Ellis

• About The Author...

Stephen Ronson grew up in Sussex, and spent a large part of his childhood exploring the woods and fields around Uckfield, many of which were still dotted with reminders of WW2 - pill boxes, tank traps, nissen huts, and graffiti left by soldiers awaiting D-Day. He is a passionate student of local history, and when he learnt about Auxiliary Units - groups of men who were instructed to lay low during the predicted nazi invasion and lead the fight back, he knew he had to write about a Sussex farmer, one with a love of the land, and a natural desire and ability to get the job done. Many of the locations and characters in the John Cook series are inspired by real places and real people. In particular, Stephen was inspired by his grandparents, Eric, Bessie, Peter and Vera, each of whom did their bit on the home front.

Nowadays, Stephen divides his time between Vermont, USA, and Uckfield, East Sussex. When he's not writing, he can be found renovating his house, or walking the woods and the fields.

The Embassy Murders by Mark Ellis

 

This book was formerly entitled Princes Gate

354 pages

You can buy The Embassey Murders...Here

You can follow Mark Ellis...Here

• The Blurb...

When a brilliant emigré scientist is killed by a hit-and-run driver and the body of an American embassy employee is washed up in the Thames, DCI Frank Merlin and his team are called to investigate.

Merlin's investigations soon ruffle feathers at the Foreign Office - the American ambassador, Joseph Kennedy, is a well-known supporter of appeasement, and has gained many powerful and influential friends in the pursuit of a negotiated peace settlement with Hitler.

The death of yet another embassy employee leads Merlin deep into the seedier quarters of wartime London, until his investigations are hampered by interfering superiors fearful of disrupting international relations. As Merlin is drawn into a web of secrets, what will the truth cost him - and Britain?

• Our Review...

The Embassy Murders is dark political crime drama that is set in the now long distant historical era of the second world war. Sadly the questions that this book asks are the same ones that we should be asking today. Indeed they are probably the same questions that should have been asked through out all history.

Namely, why do we treat people with power differently to those without power, especially when it comes to enforcing the law. Same as it ever was then. And during the early years of the Second World War the American ambassador to London had power and influence aplenty. 

Two lowly British employees of the American Embassy are murdered. Is it politically or  criminally motivated? The answers are not what you think they are. Is it irrelevant enough to sweep under the carpet? If it is hidden for the benefit of our betters, are they really our betters?

What is more important, the lives of a couple of nobodies or getting the most powerful nation in the world to fight on your side in the war? If you turn a blind eye, will it work out in the end? or could you live with the injustice. Is it a black and white issue or is it a grey area balancing act. 

The author weaves these themes wonderfully throughout his narrative. We cheer our hero Merlin on through the jungle of political interference and bureaucracy not to mention gangs of thugs, pimps and pornographers.  Merlin is a veteran of the Great War with Spanish heritage. He knows when you fight for the little people you fight for what is right. What is the point of winning a war if in doing so you lose the soul of a country.

The author does a bang up job of placing the reader in war torn London of blackouts and violent crime. For what better time to commit crime than in a blacked out city, with the best part of the police called up for active service and a population who are more concerned with bombing raids than burglaries. It's a perfect storm for the Capital's felonry. In addition the backdrop of the developing political situation is set out at a perfect pitch. There are little clues in the background of the ongoing Chamberlain/Churchill, appeasement/fight duel going on in society. Also setting the scene are a number of cameos of personalities and locations synonymous with that period. All in all the author creates a fitting landscape into which his characters and the plot is set. 

Merlin puts together, as best he can, a motley crew to chase down leads and bang on doors. He follows the twist and turns through the dark alleyways of London, while at the same time doggedly pursuing leads in the gilded halls of the rich and powerful.

If you enjoy your history, especially WW2 and you enjoy your murder mysteries, this is a very good book that will keep you entertained and questioning from begining to end.

• Selected Quotes...

People need beer to lubricate their dreams and drown their fears.

Merlin had met Mrs Gatehouse several times. A formidable lady in a formidable body.

However unlikely it may be, we don’t want the murder of an insignificant girl to queer the pitch in any way, do we?” Merlin could not help visibly bridling at this. “‘Insignificant’, sir? Are you saying you don’t want me properly to investigate the murders of ‘insignificant’ people while the war’s on?”

He still found it hard to believe that business life continued almost normally with the spectre of war, death and destruction looming larger every day, but it did. The Stock Market was as active as ever, while cargoes of oil, minerals, rubber and tea, moving largely without interference as yet over the oceans of the world, were traded freely in the commodity markets of the City. The factories of the Midlands continued to manufacture everything from cars to pots and pans. Cinemas, having been briefly closed at the outbreak of war, had reopened. Tea and cakes were still freely available at Lyons Corner Houses and cafés everywhere. People were dying natural deaths and being buried, marriages were being celebrated and, with or without benefit of the latter, babies were still being conceived. And, as he knew well, ordinary people continued to commit ordinary crimes, regardless of the latest news from Poland or France.

• If You Liked This Then You May Like...

The Unwanted Dead by Chris Lloyd

Enigma by Robert Harris

Resistance by Owen Sheers

• About The Author...

Mark Ellis is a thriller writer from Swansea and a former barrister and entrepreneur.

He is the creator of DCI Frank Merlin, an Anglo-Spanish police detective operating in World War 2 London. His books treat the reader to a vivid portrait of London during the war skilfully blended with gripping plots, political intrigue and a charismatic protagonist. 

Mark grew up under the shadow of his parents’ experience of the Second World War. His father served in the wartime navy and died a young man. His mother told him stories of watching the heavy bombardment of Swansea from the safe vantage point of a hill in Llanelli, and of attending tea dances in wartime London under the bombs and doodlebugs.

In consequence Mark has always been fascinated by WW2 and in particular the Home Front and the fact that while the nation was engaged in a heroic endeavour, crime flourished. Murder, robbery, theft and rape were rife and the Blitz provided scope for widespread looting.

This was an intriguing, harsh and cruel world. This is the world of DCI Frank Merlin.

Mark Ellis’ books regularly appear in the Kindle bestseller charts.

He is published by Headline Accent, an imprint of Headline.

He is a member of Crime Cymru, the Welsh crime writing collective, and of the Crime Writers Association (CWA).

His third book, Merlin at War, was on the CWA Historical Dagger Longlist in 2018.