I can’t comment on a book I haven’t read. What I would say is this;- Every book really worth reading on this subject, and much else aviation-wise of that period, has been written, and written by people who were actually there and involved, and, for the most part are now deceased. They wrote, very often, when the events they describe were still quite fresh in their minds. Whatever flaws these books may contain, original records and, most especially, these autobiographies are our finest sources.
‘Spitfires’ and the ‘BoB’ et al, have become a sort of cottage industry for people who actually were not only not there, not involved and were and are not even directly involved in real aviation. We have a superfluity of desktop experts, often endowed with ‘handles’ suggesting that they won the ‘BoB’ singlehandedly. Whilst those involved at the time were respectful of the past, they were not, for the most part, overly sentimental about it either. One may juxtapose this with the ghastly mawkishness that has crept-in now that the last surviving participants are fading from the scene.
There is now a vast back-catalogue of latter-day books on all the above, that, once read, scarcely need revisiting. On the other hand, those autobiographies still have the power to awaken the past – and speak with ultimate authority. One may return to them time and again to re-absorb ‘how it was’. There is always space on my shelves for another aviation autobiography. The rest – they mostly reside in dusty boxes in my loft. Probably the best place for most of them too…
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