Rating: 3.5 out of 5
I’ve generally really liked Mr White’s overviews as they are relatively light-hearted but still informative. I began the plane series a long time ago based on a recommendation and because I liked the original book, I’ve kept on going. In many ways, I found this one to be the weakest of the ones I’ve read this far, but I can’t really place my finger on the why of it.
The action was definitely more dragged out, involving people on the ground in Denmark as well as various Air Force units using Mosquitos. I think the author’s general strength lies in descriptions of aircraft and air missions, so perhaps the dragged out overview of German involvement in Denmark (which, I’ll be fair, was something I didn’t know about!) reduced the pace of the book.
Somehow, I think, that the feeling I got was the missions into Denmark were written in a way that they were more important than the assaults against Germany. Of course, this is a topic that’s debatable, but if one’s purpose is to take down a regime, then clearly hitting at it’s home front should be a bigger priority. In any case, it seemed perhaps that Mr White emphasised Denmark as a bigger war time front than it was (Danes may disagree with this one too). That’s not too say it wasn’t interesting overall, but Danish resistance wasn’t what I was looking for here.
What I was looking for was some good plane action. The missions into France were described very well, though the crown in this book was clearly the bombing attack on Copenhagen. This was one where it was easy to feel conflicted because of the trouble that arose, including the downed plane that became the target of additional bombs right next to a school. As a parent, it’s not easy to read about death and destruction in a place that should be safe. I really think that Mr White got the balance right, bringing in a few of the kids whose actions he could track during the day, including one who later decided to surpass his fear of aviation gained during the RAF bombing strike.
Overall, this was a good and a strong book! I wasn’t a fan of all of it, but on the whole there were some very memorable parts to it.
