An unsentimental and unaffected account of how the outnumbered RAF fought the Luftwaffe to a standstill during the summer and early autumn of 1940, forcing Hitler to defer his planned invasion of an isolated England. Without scanting the airmen's contribution, Hough (Born Royal, Mountbatten, etc.) and Richards (author of the official WW II history of the Royal Air Force) make clear the vital roles played by a host of others in the outcome of the Battle of Britain. Between wars, for example, government ministers and military commanders far-sightedly developed an air-defense network whose radar systems provided early warning of raids--and the means to deploy interceptors. In like vein, industry supplied replacement planes in sufficient quantities, and ground crews working under the gun of constant assaults kept them operational. The availability of 100-octane avgas (which vastly improved the performance of Spitfires and Hurricanes) also proved a decisive factor, as did the resilience of the civilian population enduring the fiery horrors of the Blitz. Even so, the authors recount, the Battle was very nearly lost until the Germans (at the Fuehrer's behest) began targeting urban centers instead of air bases, military installations, and aircraft factories. This overconfident miscalculation, they show, gave the battered RAF time to regroup. In addition, Hough and Richards convincingly discredit some enduring myths, including the notion that Chief Air Marshall Hugh (""Stuffy"") Dowding was relieved of command at the instigation of Young Turk officers. Nor, they demonstrate, did decrypts of the enemy's Enigma code afford intelligence on German attacks. A wide-ranging, painstakingly documented, and comprehensive appreciation of a turning-point engagement. The text (already published in the UK) is handsomely illustrated with contemporary photos (from German as well as British sources), plus paintings, portraits, cartoons (e.g., from Punch), newspaper tearsheets, and maps. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Even as it was being fought, the Battle of Britain assumed a place in the short list of battles (e.g., the Armada, Trafalgar) that saved the British Isles from a would-be invader. The passage of time has made clear that this battle was also one of the European war's major turning points. Had Britain been defeated, even a subsequent failure in Russia would not have been so rapidly lethal to Hitler. The authors of this study, both members of the "war generation," are accomplished military historians and have done an excellent job both of narrating the battle and of setting it in the larger framework of the development of air power. Their judgments on the controversies surrounding the battle, particularly the role of Fighter Command's Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding, seem eminently fair. The publishers have been generous with useful maps and illustrations. As a sophisticated general account for a wide readership, this replaces Derek Wood and Derek Dempster's The Narrow Margin (1961). It serves also as a useful reminder that, occasionally, battles do decide something. Undergraduate and public libraries. -R. A. Callahan, University of Delaware

Two books commemorating that climactic aerial test of wills between Great Britain and Nazi Germany, marking its fiftieth anniversary in the summer of 1990. Drawing on interviews and correspondence with more than 300 surviving air and ground crew, Hough and Richards have produced a factual yet altogether stirring account. They cover the battle in its entirety, from July through the end of October 1940, including chapters on prewar air defense measures, the outbreak of war in 1939, and events leading up to the battle. But their real focus is on the seven weeks that began in August and continued on to the end of September, when the battle hung in the balance. The book ends with a "miscellany of personal experiences" from battle veterans and a retrospective in which the authors insist that the victory of the RAF over the Luftwaffe was a decisive turning point not only in the war but in world history as well. Appendixes, sources; index. Philip Kaplan was a codesigner of One Last Look, which offered a sentimental backward look at British World War II air bases. Richard Collier is a historian who has written two previous books on the Battle of Britain (The City That Would Not Die and Eagle Day). Together, they offer a big, slick, beautifully put-together volume that's characterized throughout by an engaging text and an extraordinarily attractive graphic design. Featured are the recollections of many German and British Battle of Britain participants; period photos lifted from dozens of scrapbooks and private collections; and more than 100 photographs of Battle of Britain memorabilia, objets, and locations as they appear today. Overall, the authors strike an appropriately poignant and elegiac chord for this brief but incomparably heroic episode in the history of British civilization. Bibliography, informational summary; index. --Steve Weingartner

``Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few,'' said Churchill at the height of a three-month air battle in 1940 between the Royal Air Force and the Luftwaffe. It was a major turning point in World War II: unable to subdue the RAF, Hitler was forced to cancel his invasion of England. In their definitive account, British historians Hough and Richards explain how Fighter Command managed to send aloft (``in the right place and at the right time and with the right weapons'') the Spitfire and Hurricane pilots who won the defensive battle against great odds. The authors analyze the reasons for the Luftwaffe's failure, which include the presence of the British radar net and the German high command's error in shifting tactical attention to London instead of continuing their devastating attacks on airfields. This is a first-rate work of scholarship written for the general reader. Photos. History Book Club main selection. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

More books continue to be written about this crucial aerial campaign than any other World War II subject. Most of them stress tactics and in-the-cockpit action for the military buff. While this title by two Royal Air Force (RAF) historians has plenty of air combat scenes, it also features an intelligent and informative study of why the struggle turned out the way it did. The authors go back to the early years of the RAF for perspective and provide a mature treatment of the tactical mechanics of the battle. This book is more comprehensive, for instance, than Derek Wood and D.D. Dempster's The Narrow Margin: The Battle of Britain and the Rise of Air Power (1969. o.p.) and makes a nice supplement to the numerous pilot memoirs found in nearly every library.-- Raymond L. Puffer, U.S. Air Force History Prog., Los Angeles (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.