At just twenty-three, Major Stanley Woolley is the old man and commanding officer of Goshawk Squadron. He abhors any notion of chivalry in the clouds and is determined to obliterate the decent, gentlemanly outlook of his young, public school-educated pilots – for their own good.
But as the war goes on he is forced to throw greener and greener pilots into the meat grinder. Goshawk Squadron finds its gallows humour and black camaraderie no defence against a Spandau bullet to the back of the head . . .
The Booker-shortlisted Royal Flying Corps classic, has been reissued for the 50th Anniversary of its first publication, with an introduction by James Holland and an afterword by Mike Petty, who also reviewed this title in Slightly Foxed Issue 2.
‘Robinson is probably the best novelist ever to write about fighter combat: surprising, hyper-realistic and very, very dark.’ Spectator
Prang Wizard
Goshawk Squadron, a story of the war in the air over the Western Front, is the missing link between Catch-22 and Blackadder. It was Derek Robinson’s first novel, published in 1971, and it was...
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