The Fall of Crete

click here for more details, find new or used items	Clark Our price £4.79 (£5.99) New from £3.72 Used from £0.01 Pages: (Paperback) ISBN: 9602260904 Pub: Efstathiadis Group,Greece Pub date: 1962-01-01 Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 209451

Reader Reviews:

An excellent read (3/3 people found this helpful)

Describing the operation to take the island from the ANZAC garrison and the recently evacuated forces from the Greek debacle. Although it is generally well known that it was ‘a close-run thing’, it wasn’t until I read this book that I became aware just how close the Commonwealth forces came to pushing the Fallschirmjager off the island. But in a few days of bitter fighting the paratroopers had captured the island from a numerically superior but ill-prepared and disorganised enemy.

An excellent read - I could not put this book down.

Excellent (3/3 people found this helpful)

Excellent book from an excellent author. Minus point: almost comlete lack of maps.

A first class account of the battle for crete. (5/7 people found this helpful)

I enjoy reading books which cover the factural accounts of World War II. I could not put this book down, it is a first class account of the battle of Crete and illustrates the behind the scenes battle of red tape and communications. A must for the military reader..Well done the New Zealanders! Wills - Northern Ireland ..

What can I say, one of my favourites. (13/13 people found this helpful)

I first read this book in 1993 while on holiday in Crete, the perfect book to read seeing I was also an avid reader of military history (later to study it). I have since read it again, although not recently, but the book still stands out in my mind. Alan clark is a good historian but he is an even better writer. His style is well suited to epic and tragic events: he writes with so much feeling but also with a common sense wisdom that makes his writing appeal to non-academics. But there is plenty of scholarly research and detail for it to be read by his fellow historians and those students in between.

The book is more than just a narrative, it contains some succint analysis than rings true. His accounts of inept and confusing Allied leadership on the island is heartbreaking especially when reading of the efforts the British Commonwealth soldiers were mounting to deal with the German airborne invaders, already de-moralised from the Greek evacuation. Even more unsettling is the fact that they nearly, so closely succeeded. Of course the book also looks at the German plans and tactics within the narrative, and the subsequent hard fighting on landing. This is done in a typically Clark anecdotal fashion with detailed accounts of the bloody skirmishes. Also included is much detailed information on strengths and dispositions that never bogs you down, upsetting the flow.
If you liked Barbarossa alot and Clark's style of writing appeals, then The Fall of Crete is a recommended read, especially if one's after something a little less demanding but still requiring thought.

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