Customer Reviews

633 Squadron: Operation Rhine Maiden

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3 star:		(1)
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For a fan of 633 squadron this is a must buy. This operation comes on the heels of the svartfjord job. The squadron gets a new commander and plenty of replacements. There is tension between the new mob and the old sweats. There is a love interest for harvey and Adams is on the verge of punching two old women.The squadron of course gets an impossible mission, a deep penetration raid in daylight. If they fail it could be the end for the strategic bombing campaign. This is one of those books you will read again and again.

Decimated during the Swartfjord operation, morale in 633 Squadron is at rock bottom. The new squadron commander knows that the only thing that can save the unit is a new and challenging mission. But will it be a case of kill or cure?

The original 633 Squadron novel was written in 1958 and it suffered badly from the inexperience of the author and perhaps also the attitudes of the decade within which it was written. The characters were two dimensional, the action sequences were few and far between and the prose was both stilted and flat. ORM, while following the original story by only a few weeks was actually written some 20 years later and the intervening two decades worth of writing experience makes all the difference. In fact it's hard to credit that the two books were written by the same author.

Thus we discover a pantheon of new characters (watched over by the originals, Frank Adams, Joe Kearns and Maisie the barmaid), all with strong, individual personalities of their own. The action sequences are well crafted (albeit still a little sparse between - you can never have enough flying sequences in a novel about flying) and the plot is eventful (if somewhat predictable) and leavened with several more or less interesting sub-plots. The prose is clean and unostentatious but there are a few sequences that would never find their way into a more modern novel. So, Maisie the barmaid is both voluptuous and partial to tight fitting tops and (I quote) she "had a heart as big as her mammaries." Hmm.

In the final analysis, 633: ORM is a conventional war action adventure novel, conventional but a country mile better than its hackneyed predecessor and, if the earlier work put you off (or if you only ever saw the film and now want to read the book), it is well worth a go.

If it has no other point worthy of note it is deserving of credit for having taught me the phrase "tighter than a bull's arse in fly-time". Recommendations don't come much better than that.

Big fan of this whole series and the movie. Received book quickly and in good shape. Recommend this book and the other's in the series.

Frederick E. Smith writes a great story. I started with 633 Squadron, next Operation Rhine Maiden and just finished Operation Crucible. I have not been able to find the following: Operation Crisis,Thor and Deftant. HELP