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Nicholas (France) (2007/09/06):
Excellent book. I have to say this is the first book I've even seen made into a movie where Hollywood didn't screw it up. Granted, they invented characters, but the situations and events are the true story. The book, naturally, gives more detail on the mechanics of digging, providing clothes and documents, tools and food for the escape, which I found fascinating. You also get more sense of the grimness and hunger that can't be provided by well-fed actors.
IrishPenJen (United Kingdom) (2011/06/08):
Description:
The famous story of mass escape from a WWII German PoW camp that inspired the classic film.Review:
The Steve McQueen film of The Great Escape may have initially enjoyed mixed reviews, but has since become one of the best-loved classics of the cinema. There was no controversy about Paul Brickhill's original book, though, which has long enjoyed a reputation as being among the most astonishing true stories from the last war. In dispassionate but thoroughly involving prose, Brickhill tells how more than 600 men in a German prisoner-of-war camp formed a unit to bring off an astonishingly daring breakout. There is a whole sub-genre of prisoner war books, but this really is the high water mark: a tale of heroism, ingenuity and sheer doggedness that has an undiminished power. The book, of course is very different from the movie, and tells the tale with all Hollywood glamour stripped away. There is also an astonishing amount of detail which vividly brings to life the men involved in the escape, while never putting the breaks on the ever-accelerating tension. (Kirkus UK) What the papers say:
"For sheer suspense, puts the fictioneers to shame." Author's Biography:
Paul Brickhill was directly involved with the escape from Stalag Luft III, although he was one of the prisoners left behind. This and his other famous book Reach for the Sky are his best known works.
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