Derek Robinson

From the Phoney War of 1939 to the Battle of Britain in 1940, the pilots of Hornet Squadron learn their lessons the hard way. Hi-jinks are all very well on the ground, but once in a Hurricane's cockpit, the best killers keep their wits close. Newly promoted Commanding Officer Fanny Barton has a job on to whip the Hornets into shape before they...

1941. Hitler is rampant. Spain is neutral. Madrid, like Casablanca, the launching pad for spies from all sides. The most daring and audacious of all is codenamed "e;Eldorado"e;.Young, inexperienced, hotheaded, he had no right to survive, let alone succeed. Now his network is the most valuable in Europe, and the fates of armies lie in his...

It&'s 1953, and Luis Cabrillo has burned through the small fortune he earned from both British and German Intelligence in WW2. Now he has only his wits, his confidence, and his dazzling skills at lying and cheating. Teaming up again with Julie Conroy (a corker of a New Yorker), he follows his wartime instincts and goes where arrogance breeds...

Fresh from school in June 1916, Lieutenant Oliver Paxton's first solo flight is to lead a formation of biplanes across the Channel to join Hornet Squadron in France.Five days later, he crash-lands at his destination, having lost his map, his ballast and every single plane in his charge. To his C.O. he's an idiot, to everyone...

It's 1917, and Captain Stanley Woolley joins an R.F.C. squadron whose pilots are starting to fear the worst: their war over the Western Front may go on for years. A pilot's life is usually short, so while it lasts it is celebrated strenuously.Distractions from the brutality of the air war include British nurses; eccentric Russian pilots;...