Customer Reviews

Spitfire (Motorbooks International Warbird History)

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I have been a Jeff Ethell fan for years and have many of his books. Most are superb as Jeff was an extremely knowledgeable man when it came to the history of military aviation; especially WWII combat aircraft, and a great writer to boot!

I'm a Spitfire fan and I have most of the books out there that cover this aircraft and I am very sorry that I purchased this book. Frankly, I can't believe that Ethell wrote it because it is so poorly written. In fact, this is by far one of the worst books that I have ever seen on the Spitfire. It really does an injustice in presenting this extraordinarily fine combat aircraft.

The photo's are marginal and the combat history of the Spitfire and the more in depth coverage in the book that attempts to cover each 'Mark' of Spitfire is sketchy at best. Aside from the two older GOLD STANDARD books written on the Spifire ('Spitfire' by Alfred Price and 'Spitfire: The History' by Eric B. Morgan and Edward Shacklady) I would highly recommend the more recent book 'Spitfire' by Stewart Wilson which falls somewhere between these two in quality and I found it to be a very pleasant surprise.

This is a poorly-written book, with belaboured points, badly-written and often bland captions and a feeling that the authors are turning out a "pot-boiler." The selection of photos is poor, many are old standards and the shots of modern resorations are insipid. Ethell wrote far better books. I get the feeling that this was mainly a Pace work, as I haven't enjoyed his past works either.

The late Jeff Ethell's numerous aviation history books are legendary. Spitfire is no different. It's really, really sad that he didn't get to see the finished product when it came off the printing presses. He was a prolific writer and he is sorely missed.