Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #274614 in Books
• Published on: 2005-04-29
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Synopsis
This wide-ranging and action-wartime novel reveals the vulnerability of ordinary men and women drawn reluctantly into painful and ultimately sobering heroism. Pilot Officer Sam Carver's winter war is brief and unforgettable. A new recruit to the RAF, he is declared unfit to fly and assigned to intelligence at RAF West Fen, a bomber base in Lincolnshire where death lurks for the aircrews. But sometimes wars have to be fought in our own camp and RAF West Fen is closer to enemy territory than might be thought. Clever, alert to danger, but inexperienced and untrained, Sam relies on beginner's luck and the loyalty of his new-found friends and unlikely allies, to follow a trail of deceit and treachery across Lincolnshire into occupied Holland and back again into the wolds and fens. And after the war is won...?

Customer Reviews

Winter of Spies- A womans view?
I have just read David Newham's WINTER OF SPIES and have to rate it as one of the best wartime thrillers I have read for a long time.The plot held me engrossed for several hours - its a big book!
As I am quite hard to please, I found the characters very believable and it took me to the Lincolnshire Fens,quite literally,because it led to a visit and a magical mystery tour following the places in the book.
Although it may be a novel, it really stirs the imagination, bringing to life what it must have been like during the war years, and the young men who had a living part to play.
I should like to advise Sir David Frost not to re-make the Dambusters, ask David Newham to write a screenplay for Winter of Spies. Could be a blockbuster!!

Winter Of Spies
A different viewpoint on a well documented period in history. Believable characters and very well researched. Twists & turns throughout, with a nasty sting in the tail.
The book puts you into the situation from the first page, and from then on I found it very difficult to put down. One thing leads to another, without a dead spot occurring as can happen in some cases. The characters as they appear are brilliantly described, and you don't need a vivid imagination to picture them in your minds eye.
The technicalities, which are bound to arise in a book of this sort, are dealt with in understandable language, easily understood, and don't "Bog Down" the storyline.
As a one sentence summary, this book rattles along apace, similar to a well maintained steam railway engine.
This is David Newham's first foray into the literary world, and I for one, hope it won't be his last.

Winter of Discontent?
Brilliant first novel. It was hard to like Sam Carver with his smart ass ripostes but I suspect there was a bit of esprit d'escalier in the conversations, answers we all would have liked to have given to arrogant senior officers and colleagues but couldn't think of them at the time. The ending was gruelling and gut wrenching; it might well have been possible unfortunately. I look forward to his next book but I suspect it will not be up to this calibre; it felt like David had given his all but Winter of Spies is a worthy monument on its own.