Older books-Opinions please!

[sveahk]

Hello,

I „inherited“ some older books and would very much appreciate your opinion, as to accuracy and how readable they are today. I guess the books written or co-written by Christopher Shores are still more or less ok, but - what do you think?

Christopher Shores: Mediterranean Air War, Volume two (1973).
Raymond Lallement: Rendezvous with Fate (1964).
Hajo Hermann: Eagle’s Wings (1991).
C F Rawnsley/Robert Wright: Night Fighter (1957/1976).
John Terraine: The Right of Line (1985/1997)
Carl Olsson: From Hell to Breakfast (1943).
Christopher Shores/Brian Cull/Nicola Malizia: Malta: The Hurricane Years, 1940-41 (1987).

Thanks in advance

Hans

[Ruy Horta]

Won't comment on all the books, but I can say that Right of the Line is insightful if you are interested in the RAF. It touches many areas otherwise ignored. IMHO recommended.

Hajo's autobiography is a classic, period.

The Shores et al are also classics, but the older volumes won't be as up to date in terms of latest research. IMHO that's not a show stopper at all. Get the later Cull books to accompany them and you've caught up a lot of ground in between.

[mars]

I will recommand any books written by Shores, although this is the first time I heard of his "Mediterranean Air War", was it a photograph history of air war over Mediterranean or one like "2nd tactic airforce" ?

[sveahk]

Mars,

It says "Pictorial History of the ...", with 96 pages of photos and over 100 pages of text, "...relating the fortunes of the RAF from May 1943 to the end of the war."!

Greetings
Hans

[sveahk]

And thanks Ruy for your views!
Greetings
Hans

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Well "Mediterranean Air War" is really showing its age: it is a short history of the RAF in Med with about one hundred pictures. Was probably the best available at the time, but far more has been written since then.

"Malta the Hurricane Years" is a classic. As Ruy said the latter books from Brian Cull will give you more detailled data and pilot's testimonies but on the whole the book is still very useful. The RAF and Italian parts are still good, the German ones is as far as I know the one that is the most lacking compared to what we have access today (thanks to archives open in the meantine and of Internet that is enabling the diffusion of this data). "Malta: the Spifire Year" that was written some time later is more detailled and very interesting too.

Don't know the others but it seems to me that several are autobiographies and these are unvaluable, even if they were written half-a-century ago.

[sveahk]

Also thanks to you, Laurent, for your appraisal!
Greetings
Hans

[Jim Oxley]

Rawnsley and Wright's book "Night Fighter" is, IMHO , the best book written about the RAF's development of nigth fighter tactics and equipment. It's draws extensively on Rawnsley's RAF service in night fighting from the very earliest days of 1940 through to the end in '45 . Jimmy Rawnsley formed a formidable team with 'Catseyes' Cunninghams' as his radar operator. Some of his descriptions of intercepts over Britain in '41 are brilliant.

I also highly recommend Raymond Lallemants' Rendezvous with Fate. It covers his escape from Belgium and subsequent career in the RAF as a very successful pilot and finally as commander of the famed 609 Squadron. His combat descriptions are as good as any ever written.

[sveahk]

I just started reading Lallement's book and I totally agree with Jim, well written and to the point. I'm looking forward to the rest. Thanks Jim, for your opinion.
Greatings
Hans

[Nick Beale]

I agree completely about the Rawnsley/Wright book: really worth reading.

Chris Shores' "Pictorial History of the Mediterranean Air War" ran to 3 volumes and if you want an overview of the war in that theatre or a starting point for further reading/research then it's worth reading. What you won't get are the amounts of detail that some of us go in for these days (it would hardly be possible in a series of such scope). It's very different in approach from "2 TAF" (old or new version).