If the Germans find them, the airmen would be taken to a prison camp, the family would be shot.Īt first, there is distrust on both sides. Franklin realises how dangerous their presence is. They come to a mill where a young woman doesn’t hesitate to take them in, feed them & hide them until her father can arrange for their escape. When their food runs out, & Franklin’s injury is slowing them down, they realise they will have to ask for help. They set off to make their way south to Spain & home. Franklin lands in a marsh & while the others are uninjured, his arm is badly damaged. The camaraderie of the crew is quickly established as a routine flight home almost turns to tragedy when an air-screw comes loose & they have to make an emergency landing. It’s the story of John Franklin, a bomber pilot & his crew, forced to land in Occupied France on the way home from a raid.

It gives the story such tension & immediacy, the same kind of immediacy I get from reading diaries & letters of the period.įair Stood the Wind for France is by H E Bates, probably better known these days for his Darling Buds Of May novels about the Larkin family. I love reading a book where the author didn’t know how the war would end. Reading the many Persephone titles written during WWI & WWII has spoiled me for modern fictional recreations of those times. I also haven’t read any non-fiction for some time, George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia was the last, over a month ago. I’ve found myself mostly back in the 19th century with occasional forays into the early 20th. Apart from Bertie Plays the Blues, I can’t remember the last modern novel I read.

Fair stood the wind for france review