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Hornet Flight - Ken Follett
I like Ken Follett's books, and I like airplanes, and I like historical books, but this one was just kind of lackluster for me, unfortunately. It kept me reading, and parts of it were very engaging, but I ended up feeling kind of "That was it?" at the end. I mean, to be fair, this book is set early in WW2 and there's a lot of war still to go, but it feels like we didn't quite get the full plot or the amount of airplane that was promised by the title. The airplane-promising title manages to be a big spoiler while not actually delivering on its promise. (Although, to be fair, I guess it did get me to read the book.)
Like most of his books, there's a fairly large cast of characters, moving back and forth between the good guys and the bad guys. It's early in WW2, and most of the book takes place in occupied Denmark focused around two brothers, Harald and Arne, and Arne's English girlfriend Hermia, who, at the start of the book, is back in England working for MI6.
Hermia spent most of her life in Denmark and is fluent in Danish, and during her last few months in Denmark, before leaving pre-invasion, she started a secret resistance movement including nearly all of her and Arne's friend group ... except for Arne, who the rest of the group felt was too open and friendly to be trusted as a spy. Arne's younger brother Harald definitely doesn't know about it, but he is clever and quick-minded and interested in mechanical things. This gets him involved in the plot when he takes a nighttime shortcut across the edge of a German military installation on the coastal Danish island where both brothers grew up, and spots an antenna array that turns out to be how the Germans are targeting and destroying RAF bombers.
Plot happens on both sides of the sea, and Hermia makes contact with Arne - via a daring subterfuge that involves getting a fishing boat to slip her onto a Danish vacation island as close to Sweden as possible - and finally recruits him for her resistance group because she needs him to find a way to pass photos of the antenna to England. Throughout all of this, an obsessed Danish policeman with a grudge against Arne and Harald's family pursues them.
Okay, so where's the airplane in all of this? The airplane is an old Hornet Moth stored in a garage (technically an abandoned church) near the home of another of Arne and Hermia's friend group, whose wealthy, well-connected family are Jewish. The younger daughter of the family, Karen, is about Harald's age, befriends him, and turns out to be able to fly a plane, so the two of them conspire to fix the Hornet Moth and fly it to England with the film containing the pictures of the antenna array.
[Bigger spoilers from here onwards]
The reason why I say the airplane is both a spoiler and a disappointment is because it doesn't even come into the plot until most of the way through the book, and it wouldn't be clear except from the title that it's going to be instrumental in getting the film to England - but then, the part of the book dealing with the plane is a relatively minor part of the whole, and Harald and Karen's desperate flight across the sea (although tense) is about a chapter, all the previous plot threads are abruptly tied up or just vanish, and then the book ends.
FWIW I think that a lot of Follett's books, and books in this sort of historical thriller subgenre tend to do that anyway - the sudden endings as soon as the main thriller plot ties up - but I feel like I was more aware of it this time than usual because there was a lot going on, and then suddenly the villain dies in a way that is poetically justicey and yet disappointing without the protagonists really doing anything, and all the other plot threads just stop.
In the meantime, we never find out what happens to the villain's girlfriend (I had been halfway guessing that she was in the resistance herself, but I guess not) or Karen's family (Jewish! In occupied Denmark!) or Harald and Arne's parents (Arne has died of plot by this point, but the police know that Arne and Harald were both in the resistance, and have the parents on their radar). Also, Hermia is last seen stranded in Denmark with the police after her, and then turns up in England in a brief cameo in the epilogue and a passing mention of having gotten out - I wanted to see that! (I felt like I was more engaged in Hermia running around Denmark dodging the police than in most of what was going on with Harald and Karen anyway.)
But mostly, I wouldn't have minded more plane. To be fair, what plane we do get is tense and exciting; it just doesn't go on very long and ends kind of anticlimactically.
Like most of his books, there's a fairly large cast of characters, moving back and forth between the good guys and the bad guys. It's early in WW2, and most of the book takes place in occupied Denmark focused around two brothers, Harald and Arne, and Arne's English girlfriend Hermia, who, at the start of the book, is back in England working for MI6.
Hermia spent most of her life in Denmark and is fluent in Danish, and during her last few months in Denmark, before leaving pre-invasion, she started a secret resistance movement including nearly all of her and Arne's friend group ... except for Arne, who the rest of the group felt was too open and friendly to be trusted as a spy. Arne's younger brother Harald definitely doesn't know about it, but he is clever and quick-minded and interested in mechanical things. This gets him involved in the plot when he takes a nighttime shortcut across the edge of a German military installation on the coastal Danish island where both brothers grew up, and spots an antenna array that turns out to be how the Germans are targeting and destroying RAF bombers.
Plot happens on both sides of the sea, and Hermia makes contact with Arne - via a daring subterfuge that involves getting a fishing boat to slip her onto a Danish vacation island as close to Sweden as possible - and finally recruits him for her resistance group because she needs him to find a way to pass photos of the antenna to England. Throughout all of this, an obsessed Danish policeman with a grudge against Arne and Harald's family pursues them.
Okay, so where's the airplane in all of this? The airplane is an old Hornet Moth stored in a garage (technically an abandoned church) near the home of another of Arne and Hermia's friend group, whose wealthy, well-connected family are Jewish. The younger daughter of the family, Karen, is about Harald's age, befriends him, and turns out to be able to fly a plane, so the two of them conspire to fix the Hornet Moth and fly it to England with the film containing the pictures of the antenna array.
[Bigger spoilers from here onwards]
The reason why I say the airplane is both a spoiler and a disappointment is because it doesn't even come into the plot until most of the way through the book, and it wouldn't be clear except from the title that it's going to be instrumental in getting the film to England - but then, the part of the book dealing with the plane is a relatively minor part of the whole, and Harald and Karen's desperate flight across the sea (although tense) is about a chapter, all the previous plot threads are abruptly tied up or just vanish, and then the book ends.
FWIW I think that a lot of Follett's books, and books in this sort of historical thriller subgenre tend to do that anyway - the sudden endings as soon as the main thriller plot ties up - but I feel like I was more aware of it this time than usual because there was a lot going on, and then suddenly the villain dies in a way that is poetically justicey and yet disappointing without the protagonists really doing anything, and all the other plot threads just stop.
Spoiler for that
He shows up while they're trying to take off, tries to ram the plane with his car, and accidentally drives into a fuel tanker. Poetic justice because he killed one of the nice characters via immolation earlier (shot the fuel tank of a different plane while one of the members of the resistance was taking off) so it couldn't happen to a nicer guy, but also, my reaction to his sudden flaming death after a series of relatively low-key and ordinary events leading up to it was less "yay!" and more "wat."In the meantime, we never find out what happens to the villain's girlfriend (I had been halfway guessing that she was in the resistance herself, but I guess not) or Karen's family (Jewish! In occupied Denmark!) or Harald and Arne's parents (Arne has died of plot by this point, but the police know that Arne and Harald were both in the resistance, and have the parents on their radar). Also, Hermia is last seen stranded in Denmark with the police after her, and then turns up in England in a brief cameo in the epilogue and a passing mention of having gotten out - I wanted to see that! (I felt like I was more engaged in Hermia running around Denmark dodging the police than in most of what was going on with Harald and Karen anyway.)
But mostly, I wouldn't have minded more plane. To be fair, what plane we do get is tense and exciting; it just doesn't go on very long and ends kind of anticlimactically.