A Chilling Tale Of Winter Warfare.

Once again we turn our blog page over to a guest book review. Please note that the reviewer received a free review copy of the book, but was not paid for the review or offered any other inducements.

The views expressed are those of the reviewer and not necessarily those of Selfishgenie Publishing.

Having recently read Peter Caddick-Adams’ excellent account of the Battle of the Bulge (as it was called by the Allies), in Snow and Steel: Battle of The Bulge 1944-45 I was keen to see  what Miles Watson, the author of “The Very Dead Of Winter” would make of telling a fictionalised account.
 
For a start, had he done his research?
 
It turns out that he had, and I am happy to accept as poetic licence any differences between the known facts and the story as told in this book. In his historical notes at the end of the book, Miles Watson does mention that he has strayed from the known facts in one or two places.
 
But there is a lot more to this book than just the historical accuracy. It is a really great read.
 
So, the setting.
 
It is December 1944 in the Ardennes forest on the borders between Germany, Belgium and Luxembourg. After fighting their way from Normandy, the American Army is pausing for breath and the bad weather doesn’t encourage campaigning.
 
But the Germans have other ideas. Hitler’s latest master plan is to launch a surprise attack through the Ardennes, just as his armies did so successfully in 1940, aiming to reach the port of Antwerp and cut the British in northern Belgium off from their American allies in the south. Without an ability re-supply, the British would have to surrender and without their ally on their northern flank, the Americans would have to stop to re-group and re-position their already stretched forces. That hiatus, so Hitler thinks, will allow him to concentrate on defeating Russia in the east before suing for peace in the west..
 
Hitler called it Operation Wacht am Rhein (watch on the Rhein), but it had been quietly renamed Operation Herbst Nebel (Autumn mist). It is one of the coldest winters for years and the weather is so bad the Allied air forces are grounded, giving the German Army a much needed advantage.
 
The story is told from three different points of view.
 
The first is Top Sergeant Edward T Halleck, a former cowboy and rodeo rider who has been in combat since the American landings in Morocco in 1942. Wounded in the vicious fighting in the Hȕrtgen Forest, Halleck deserts from his hospital bed but, unlike other deserters, he isn’t running away from the fight, he is trying to get back into it. At which point he is arrested by MPs and taken before a General, who decides a hero like Halleck is just what his inexperienced men need to see in order to bolster their fighting spirit. Halleck is sent to tour the front line and arrives just in time to get caught up in the opening attacks of the battle.
 
The second point of view is from Second Lieutenant Robert O Breese, Halleck’s former green-as-grass platoon commander. He, too, was sent to hospital after being in the Hȕrtgen, but he is what the American Army calls a Section 8. In other words he is mentally ill. Breese disputes this with his psychiatrist and persuades him to let him return to battle. Thanks to an exhausted truck driver, Breese is involved in a crash that leaves him the only survivor, at which point he decides to launch a one man revenge campaign on the Germans who had destroyed his platoon in the Hȕrtgen.
 
The final point of view is that of OberstLeutnant (Lieutenant Colonel) August Cramm. He is a career soldier from a family of career soldiers that goes back almost a thousand years. He has lost an eye and an arm to the war already and knows his chances of survival are slim. As the Intelligence Officer of a Volksgrenadier division, he makes it his job to try to prevent unnecessary loss of life amongst the soldiers of his division, despite the profligacy of the Divisional commander. Once a believer in the German cause, now he is cynical, but is as determined to do his duty as ever he was.
 
Each chapter takes turns to show us how the battle was fought from the three different points of view. However, this book isn’t about grand strategy, it’s about the soldiers who fought the battle and the loss of life and cruel conditions that the combatants had to endure. It’s also about the chaos and mistakes in decision making that nearly led to a disaster for the Americans and eventually did result in disaster for the Germans.
 
A map of the battlefield would have helped, in order to picture where the three different characters are, but that is a minor quibble.
 
History tells us the outcome of this battle, but the questions that readers like me will be asking is “which of these three men, if any, will survive the battle?” and “What lasting effect will the battle have on them if they do survive?”
 
But I’m not going to spoil the book by telling you.
 
The three main characters are well rounded and believable. From the half-crazy Breese to hard bitten Halleck and the cynical Cramm, we get a good feel for what the battle did to the soldiers. At times I felt myself shivering from the cold even as the sun shone outside my window. I could smell the explosives and the powder, the blood and the guts. Time flew by as I immersed myself in the story and it is rare that a book has that ability to absorb me so deeply. The pace of the story is almost exhausting, and I felt almost as tired as Watson’s characters at times.
 
I was torn between giving this book 4 or 5 stars.
 
There are quite a few typos, eg the word ‘all’ loses its second l on many occasions and there are many others. But the sheer skill of the story telling far outweighs these minor flaws, so 5 stars it is.
 
If you are a lover of historical fiction, a lover of military themed fiction or you just love a bit of action and adventure, then this book is definitely the one for you. I have no reservations about recommending it to readers of this blog.
 
To find out more about “The Very Dead of Winter”, by Miles Watson, just click the link below.

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The Very Dead Of Winter

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