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Easter Day 1941
An English tank crew led by an American expatriate and trapped behind enemy lines, tries to reach safety at the Allied stronghold of Tobruk
- GenresHistorical Fiction
235 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1987
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
January 31, 2022
A book I never really got into as the protagonist was my main problem with this book, called "Peter" (apparently not even his real name), he is an American and a veteran of the Spanish Civil War where his hatred for Germans was obviously born. His actions are very gung-ho and he often executes his prisoners and even tortures them, and then to make him a bit human, he shows mercy to some. His crew on the captured Italian tank are real Tommies and they save the story from a whole cast of other bad characters that are introduced throughout the book. The other saving grace for the book is that the action sequences are pretty good and the horrors of the battlefields are also well described in all it's gory details. There are many other better World War 2 novels out there that I would recommend before this one.
January 17, 2022
A well-crafted and realistic look at the war in the desert in 1941. Easter Day 1941 is dramatically tense with good characterizations. It deserves greater recognition.
January 18, 2024
I first read this book back in 1988 at the tender age of 12, and am now re-reading it, not only with an adult’s perspective but with the perspective of someone who served in the military (albeit in a different branch and country of service than that of the protagonist).
A harrowing, action-packed novel of desert warfare during WWII’s North Africa campaign. It’s told from the first-person narrative of Peter (we never learn his surname, though we learn the names of his subordinate tank crew members: Smythe, Mackeson, and Allison, and later Mohammed and Chowduri), an American expat serving as a Sergeant in the British Army subsequent to his volunteer soldiering with the International Brigades during the Spanish Civil War. I’ve tried to figure out whether the author, G(ail) F(rey) Borden, actually served in the military, but my Internet research hasn’t yielded either a “Yea” or “Nay” answer to this question.
Noteworthy passages:
“[T]he M13/40 isn’t worth much. For although it has lines reminiscent of the Russian T-34/76, that faint similarity, and diesel engines, are all the two AFVs have in common. The M13/40 has a poor power to weight ratio and is slow off the road. It is also poorly gunned and mechanically unsound. It has a high silhouette, which in armored warfare means death. Its plates are held together with rivets. Rivets are unnerving: any solid shot striking the M13/40, even if it does not penetrate, may pound a rivet into a fighting compartment; and any such rivet will be moving almost as fast as the shot that struck the tank’s carapace.”
“I rip the tape away and hold up the pistol to look at it. I know this weapon: .11 caliber, half the diameter of a .22. I saw it in Spain. The Fascists used it to neck-shoot prisoners. It is the answer to the question of how little materiel need be expended to kill another human being. Properly handled, the pistol in lethal.”
A harrowing, action-packed novel of desert warfare during WWII’s North Africa campaign. It’s told from the first-person narrative of Peter (we never learn his surname, though we learn the names of his subordinate tank crew members: Smythe, Mackeson, and Allison, and later Mohammed and Chowduri), an American expat serving as a Sergeant in the British Army subsequent to his volunteer soldiering with the International Brigades during the Spanish Civil War. I’ve tried to figure out whether the author, G(ail) F(rey) Borden, actually served in the military, but my Internet research hasn’t yielded either a “Yea” or “Nay” answer to this question.
Noteworthy passages:
“[T]he M13/40 isn’t worth much. For although it has lines reminiscent of the Russian T-34/76, that faint similarity, and diesel engines, are all the two AFVs have in common. The M13/40 has a poor power to weight ratio and is slow off the road. It is also poorly gunned and mechanically unsound. It has a high silhouette, which in armored warfare means death. Its plates are held together with rivets. Rivets are unnerving: any solid shot striking the M13/40, even if it does not penetrate, may pound a rivet into a fighting compartment; and any such rivet will be moving almost as fast as the shot that struck the tank’s carapace.”
“I rip the tape away and hold up the pistol to look at it. I know this weapon: .11 caliber, half the diameter of a .22. I saw it in Spain. The Fascists used it to neck-shoot prisoners. It is the answer to the question of how little materiel need be expended to kill another human being. Properly handled, the pistol in lethal.”
February 24, 2008
Crew of a small poorly built Italian tank try to survive in the North African desert against the massed might of Rommel's heavy armored forces.
A cracking good read. Tense, good characterizations, humor, good history and tightly researched details.
I re-read this every couple of years or so.
A cracking good read. Tense, good characterizations, humor, good history and tightly researched details.
I re-read this every couple of years or so.
August 8, 2008
A freightening look at desert warfare during WWII. Borden sure knows how to write 'em. Grabs the reader right at page one and never lets up. Horrifying, one can feel the heat and smell death with every turn of the page.
Borden picks right up where he left off with his next novel Seven Six One.
Borden picks right up where he left off with his next novel Seven Six One.
August 26, 2013
-Friendship of opposite sides although their governments and armies were fighting.
-Humanity in the war.
-Survival and action with perseverance
-Humanity in the war.
-Survival and action with perseverance
January 14, 2024
Text - Great book - gritty realistic - bought paperback in airport and couldn't put down - still one of my favorites
October 7, 2023
An intense, brutal novel that covers one day in the North African desert during the war.
The protagonist is a veteran of the Spanish Civil War and has long ago adopted a pragmatic, cynical outlook on fighting a war. He can be quite ruthless when he feels its required, but also accepts his responsibility to the men he commands and on several occasions shows suprising mercy to the enemy.
The enemy are the German. The protagonist's first name is Peter. I don't think we ever learn his first name and we're told he's not using his real name anyways. He's an expatriate American now serving with the British, commanding an Italian-made tank that had been captured and taken into British service months earlier.
Now he and his three crewmen are trapped behind enemy lines after Rommel's troops overrun most of the desert. They find out Tobruk is still holding out and make that their destination. The trip through the roasting hot desert is punctuated by encounters with German or Italians. Notably action scenes include the tank ambushing a convoy and later dodging bombs as Italian planes attack them. The tank crew takes casualties, picks up other stragglers, finds a source of badly needed fuel and finally finds themselves near Tobruk without any idea of how to get past the Germans and then not get shot by Australian troops overwards.
Great book that is very difficult to put down once you've started it.
The protagonist is a veteran of the Spanish Civil War and has long ago adopted a pragmatic, cynical outlook on fighting a war. He can be quite ruthless when he feels its required, but also accepts his responsibility to the men he commands and on several occasions shows suprising mercy to the enemy.
The enemy are the German. The protagonist's first name is Peter. I don't think we ever learn his first name and we're told he's not using his real name anyways. He's an expatriate American now serving with the British, commanding an Italian-made tank that had been captured and taken into British service months earlier.
Now he and his three crewmen are trapped behind enemy lines after Rommel's troops overrun most of the desert. They find out Tobruk is still holding out and make that their destination. The trip through the roasting hot desert is punctuated by encounters with German or Italians. Notably action scenes include the tank ambushing a convoy and later dodging bombs as Italian planes attack them. The tank crew takes casualties, picks up other stragglers, finds a source of badly needed fuel and finally finds themselves near Tobruk without any idea of how to get past the Germans and then not get shot by Australian troops overwards.
Great book that is very difficult to put down once you've started it.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews