Hullo Russia, Goodbye England

Author: Derek Robinson
Publisher: MacLehose Press
ISBN: 1623655005
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 279

Book Description
Flight Lieutenant Silk, a twice-decorated Lancaster pilot in WW II, rejoins the R.A.F. and qualifies to fly the Vulcan bomber. Piloting a Vulcan is an unforgettable experience: no other aircraft comes close to matching its all-round performance. And as bombers go, it's drop-dead gorgeous. But there's a catch. The Vulcan has only one role: to make a second strike. To act in retaliation for a Russian nuclear attack. Silk knows that knows that if he ever flies his Vulcan in anger, he'll be flying from a smoking wasteland, a Britain obliterated. But in the mad world of Mutually Assured Destruction, the Vulcan is the last--the only--deterrent. Derek Robinson returns with another rip-roaring, gung-ho R.A.F. adventure, one that exposes and confronts the brinkmanship and saber-rattling of the Cold War Era.

Hullo Russia, Goodbye England

Author: Derek Robinson
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 0857385615
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 279

Book Description
Flight Lieutenant Silk, a twice-decorated Lancaster pilot in WW II, rejoins the R.A.F. and qualifies to fly the Vulcan bomber. Piloting a Vulcan is an unforgettable experience: no other aircraft comes close to matching its all-round performance. And as bombers go, it's drop-dead gorgeous. But there's a catch. The Vulcan has only one role: to make a second strike. To act in retaliation for a Russian nuclear attack. Silk knows that knows that if he ever flies his Vulcan in anger, he'll be flying from a smoking wasteland, a Britain obliterated. But in the mad world of Mutually Assured Destruction, the Vulcan is the last - the only - deterrent. Derek Robinson returns with another rip-roaring, gung-ho R.A.F. adventure, one that exposes and confronts the brinkmanship and sabre-rattling of the Cold War Era.

A Good Clean Fight

Author: Derek Robinson
Publisher: MacLehose Press
ISBN: 1623653185
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 628

Book Description
North Africa, 1942. Dust, heat, thirst, flies. A good clean fight, for those who like that sort of thing, and some do. From an advanced landing field, striking hard and escaping fast, our old friends from Hornet Squadron (Piece of Cake) play Russian roulette, flying their clapped-out Tomahawks on ground-strafing forays. Meanwhile, on the ground, the men of Captain Lampard's S.A.S. patrol drive hundreds of miles behind enemy lines to plant bombs on German aircraft. This is the story of a war of no glamor and few heroes, in a setting often more lethal than the enemy.

The Battle of Britain on Screen

Author: S. P. MacKenzie
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 147422847X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 193

Book Description
This new, updated edition of The Battle of Britain on Screen examines in depth the origins, development and reception of the major dramatic screen representations of 'The Few' in the Battle of Britain produced over the past 75 years. Paul MacKenzie explores both continuity and change in the presentation of a wartime event that acquired and retains near-mythical dimensions in popular consciousness and has been represented many times in feature films and television dramas. Alongside relevant technical developments, the book also examines the social, cultural, and political changes occurring in the second half of the 20th century and first decade of current century that helped shape how the battle came to be framed dramatically. This edition contains a new chapter looking at the portrayal of the Battle of Britain at the time of its 70th anniversary. Through its perceptive demonstration of how our memory of the battle has been constantly reshaped through film and television, The Battle of Britain on Screen provides students of the Second World War, 20th-century Britain and film history with a thorough and complex understanding of an iconic historical event.

The Well of Loneliness

Author: Radclyffe Hall
Publisher: Read Books Ltd
ISBN: 1473374081
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 464

Book Description
This early work by Radclyffe Hall was originally published in 1928 and we are now republishing it with a brand new introductory biography. 'The Well of Loneliness' is a novel that follows an upper-class Englishwoman who falls in love with another woman while serving as an ambulance driver in World War I. Marguerite Radclyffe Hall was born on 12th August 1880, in Bournemouth, England. Hall's first novel The Unlit Lamp (1924) was a lengthy and grim tale that proved hard to sell. It was only published following the success of the much lighter social comedy The Forge (1924), which made the best-seller list of John O'London's Weekly. Hall is a key figure in lesbian literature for her novel The Well of Loneliness (1928). This is her only work with overt lesbian themes and tells the story of the life of a masculine lesbian named Stephen Gordon.

A Splendid Little War

Author: Derek Robinson
Publisher: MacLehose Press
ISBN: 1623654998
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 415

Book Description
The war to end all wars, people said in 1918. Not for long. By 1919, White Russians were fighting Bolshevik Reds for control of their country, and Winston Churchill (then Secretary of State for War) wanted to see Communism "strangled in its cradle". So a volunteer R.A.F. squadron, flying Sopwith Camels, went there to duff up the Reds. "There's a splendid little war going on," a British staff officer told them. "You'll like it." Looked like fun. But the war was neither splendid nor little. It was big and it was brutal, a grim conflict of attrition, marked by incompetence and corruption. Before it ended, the squadron wished that both sides would lose. If that was a joke, nobody was laughing.

Invasion, 1940

Author: Derek Robinson
Publisher: Da Capo Press
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 352

Book Description
"What stopped Hitler in 1940 - why did he not attempt to invade Britain? And if he had, would he have been successful? Most of us would answer that "The Few" of Fighter Command saved Britain from certain invasion, because every historian of World War Two, from Winston Churchill onwards, has said so. Yet in this fresh look, Derek Robinson argues that the Battle of Britain alone could not have been why Operation Sealion, the planned German invasion, was scrapped. The greater obstacle was a force that both Churchill and Hitler failed to acknowledge." "Robinson suggests that most accounts of 1940 are written as if the Channel and the Royal Navy did not exist. In fact, an inadequate German fleet was relying on the use of 1,000 flat-bottomed barges as landing craft - which even in a flat calm would have taken ten days to effect the complete landing. These cumbersome vessels would also have been sitting ducks for the Royal Navy, which at that time was still massive - 70 to 80 destroyers were ready and waiting in home waters." "The skill and courage of the Spitfire and Hurricane pilots who fought the Battle of Britain are not in question, and Robinson never downplays the extent of their sacrifice - he is the author of many acclaimed books depicting the lives of fighter pilots in both world wars. Here he challenges a verdict that has been in place for 50 years and his views will be unwelcome to some. But as well as relating the Battle of Britain with his trademark realism, Robinson now presents clear evidence to make us question our easy acceptance of the old story."--BOOK JACKET.

From Russia With Love

Author: Ian Fleming
Publisher: DigiCat
ISBN:
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 222

Book Description
DigiCat Publishing presents to you this special edition of "From Russia With Love" by Ian Fleming. DigiCat Publishing considers every written word to be a legacy of humankind. Every DigiCat book has been carefully reproduced for republishing in a new modern format. The books are available in print, as well as ebooks. DigiCat hopes you will treat this work with the acknowledgment and passion it deserves as a classic of world literature.

Piece of Cake

Author: Derek Robinson
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 0857385623
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 640

Book Description
From the Phoney War of 1939 to the Battle of Britain in 1940, the pilots of Hornet Squadron learn their lessons the hard way. Hi-jinks are all very well on the ground, but once in a Hurricane's cockpit, the best killers keep their wits close. Newly promoted Commanding Officer Fanny Barton has a job on to whip the Hornets into shape before they face the Luftwaffe's seasoned pilots. And sometimes Fighter Command, with its obsolete tactics and stiff doctrines, is the real menace. As with all Robinson's novels, the raw dialogue, rich black humour and brilliantly rendered, adrenalin-packed dogfights bring the Battle of Britain, and the brave few who fought it, to life.

One of Ours

Author: Willa Cather
Publisher: e-artnow
ISBN:
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 385

Book Description
Claude Wheeler is a young man who was born after the American frontier has vanished. The son of a successful farmer and an intensely pious mother, Wheeler is guaranteed a comfortable livelihood. Nevertheless, Wheeler views himself as a victim of his father's success and his own inexplicable malaise.Thus, devoid of parental and spousal love, Wheeler finds a new purpose to his life in France, a faraway country that only existed for him in maps before the First World War. Will Wheeler ever succeed in his new goal? The novel is inspired from real-life events and also won the Pulitzer Prize in 1923.