Customer Reviews

Blood of Honour (Jack Tanner 3)

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Billed as "Sharpe for WWII meets Commando comics" that description is completely correct. This is the third in the Jack Tanner series, and really its more of the same: if you liked the previous two books (The Odin Mission and Darkest Hour) then you'll like this. If military fiction is not your thing, then you won't - there is not a lot of gripping characterisation going on here, more struggle for survival with extra explosives.

Blood of Honour is the 1941 Battle of Crete, and is historically accurate in details large and small (as you'd expect from a historian who also writes novels). There is a short note at the end of the book about the real campaign and how it played out: it really is a bit of a mystery how Crete fell to the Nazis.

Tanner here is part of the British army dug in at Heraklion, fending off the assault by German paratroopers, while making friends and enemies (not necessarily in that order) with the locals and then retreating by RN Destroyer, pleasure yacht, foot and submarine. Holland does a good job of capturing the fatigue and disappointment of retreat after retreat for the British Army, but then again, you are never in any doubt about how it will all end: Tanner is never in any real danger, in the sense it is always clear he is our hero, for all he is drawn in the odd shade of grey.

I haven't read Sharpe (yet) so can't speak how it compares in a literary sense, but this is readable, accurate and, if you want suspense, why read military historical fiction at all - the result has generally been known for a fair while! Holland is probably a better historian than fictioneer, yet one can do worse than read Blood of Honour.

This is the third novel by James Holland to feature his WW2 hero, Jack Tanner. A blend of those old war comics that some of us read as kids, Bernard Cornwell style stories and the author's historical knowledge. Cornwell comparisons are inevitable, but the author rightly identified a cap in the market for Sharpe like stories set in the Second World War. In general the series is fun and does exactly what is says on the tin, a fast moving action story laced with slightly over the top bad guys, incompetent officers and good old British fighting spirit.

Here we have Tanner in Crete helping fend off the German invasion. In fairness to the author, he tries to flesh out Tanner a little more. Our hero arrives on the Island a bit grumpy about the way the allied forces are retreating and it does not take long for him to upset a new officer and the leader of the local partisans. We also learn a few more snippets about his background which helps add to the character.

As German paratroopers drop onto Crete, Tanner and his men are involved in fierce fighting, but after initial success the situation changes and Tanner and co end up retreating towards the mountains and needing the support of the partisans that he has made enemies of. So it has pace and drama a plenty, it sometimes lacks a bit of the atmosphere of the time, the culture and the climate. It's an place and aspect of WW2 that I knew little about and perhaps could have done with more atmospheric background but this is still boys own stuff and an easy fun read.