A Good Clean Fight - Tapa dura

North Africa, spring 1942. Dust, heat, thirst, flies. For those who liked that sort of thing, it was a good clean fight: nothing to harm but the sand, the enemy and yourself. From the Author of the Booker Prize-shortlisted 'Goshawk Squadron' and 'Piece of Cake' comes the ruthlessly funny, heart-wrenching and utterly convincing story of the desert war waged by the men of the RAF and SAS – a war in which there is no glamour and no heroes, just survivors.

Striking hard and escaping fast, Fanny Barton's squadron play Russian roulette at 300 miles an hour and zero feet, flying their clapped out Tomahawks on ground-strafing forays. On the ground, the men of Captain Lampard's SAS patrol drive hundreds of miles behind enemy lines to plant bombs on German aircraft, then vanish into the Sahara while the fuses still burn. But the Germans are not about to take these attacks sitting down; an expeditionary force is sent out to beat the SAS at its own game.

Being an Intelligence Officer in the midst of all this mayhem is the ultimate misnomer: both reason and intelligence crumble into the desert sand while the battle resumes in an insane frenzy of twisted wits and fraught nerves. Paul Schramm and his RAF counterpart, Skull Skelton, are only too aware of this savage and uncertain logic, but Dr Maria Grandinetti, an exile from Mussolini Fascist regime, views the fight as anything from a bad joke to good psychotherapy. Meanwhile in Cairo, two ill-matched war reporters seek a scoop for the folks back home; and if they can't find one, then they'll create it.

"Robinson writes with a tireless enthusiasm which never sacrifices detail to pace, or vice versa... terrific"
JENNIFER SELWAY, 'OBSERVER'

"A cynicism and hard-bitten humour that has you half way between tears and laughter. Biggles was never like this"
DAILY EXPRESS