Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3741330 in Books
• Published on: 1978-09-07
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 144 pages

Review
Published in Britain in 1978, this is the first volume in an RAF series featuring Sgt. George Yeoman - a young pilot sent to France in May 1940, just as the "phony war" shifts to something real and bloody. Only a few hours after arrival Yeoman and his Hurricane fighter take part in an unauthorized escort sortie, engaging in one-on-one air battle with a Messerschmitt 109 piloted by German flight cadet Joachim Richter. (Richter is apparently going to be Yeoman's honorable nemesis throughout the series.) On a later mission Yeoman shoots down a Dornier, feeling "no elation. . . . It had been a completely impersonal act." Moving north and west as the Germans invade, Yeoman and his comrades are sent out to destroy crucial bridges, with some small success. But then Yeoman is shot down, lands in one piece, and joins up with fleeing French civilians - rescuing an orphaned girl, meeting US newswoman Julia (they promptly fall in love), reaching Paris via motorcycle, receiving personal encouragement from Churchill. And finally, after rejoining his squadron in Calais, Yeoman flies patrols over Dunkirk and winds up in the nautical evacuation - as German counterpart Richter, a POW, bravely escapes to rejoin the Luftwaffe. . . after a brief moment of path-crossing at Dunkirk. ("Two young men who had already met more than once in air combat, but would never know it, at last stood face to face through one of the incredible coincidences that occur so often in time of war.") Complete with cliffhanger ending: a WW II series in decent, standard YA style - weak on characterization, but okay on aeronautical detail and deglamorized war-horror. (For a grownup book on the same front, see Derek Robinson's Piece of Cake, p. 107.) (Kirkus Reviews)