A Higher Call: The Incredible True Story of Heroism and Chivalry during the Second World War
Apr 2013 · Atlantic Books Ltd
4.7star
89 reviewsreport
Ebook
400
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About this ebook
This instant Sunday Times bestseller tells the story of two fighter pilots whose remarkable encounter during World War II became the stuff of legend.
Five days before Christmas 1943, a badly damaged American bomber struggled to fly over wartime Germany. At its controls was a twenty-one-year-old pilot. Half his crew lay wounded or dead. Suddenly a German Messerschmitt fighter pulled up on the bomber's tail - the German pilot was an ace, a man able to destroy the American bomber with the squeeze of a trigger. This is the true story of the two pilots whose lives collided in the skies that day - the American - 2nd Lieutenant Charlie Brown and the German - 2nd Lieutenant Franz Stigler.
A Higher Call follows both Charlie and Franz's harrowing missions and gives a dramatic account of the moment when they would stare across the frozen skies at one another. What happened between them, the American 8th Air Force would later classify as 'top secret'. It was an act that Franz could never mention or else face a firing squad. It was the encounter that would haunt both Charlie and Franz for forty years until, as old men, they would seek out one another and reunite.
Five days before Christmas 1943, a badly damaged American bomber struggled to fly over wartime Germany. At its controls was a twenty-one-year-old pilot. Half his crew lay wounded or dead. Suddenly a German Messerschmitt fighter pulled up on the bomber's tail - the German pilot was an ace, a man able to destroy the American bomber with the squeeze of a trigger. This is the true story of the two pilots whose lives collided in the skies that day - the American - 2nd Lieutenant Charlie Brown and the German - 2nd Lieutenant Franz Stigler.
A Higher Call follows both Charlie and Franz's harrowing missions and gives a dramatic account of the moment when they would stare across the frozen skies at one another. What happened between them, the American 8th Air Force would later classify as 'top secret'. It was an act that Franz could never mention or else face a firing squad. It was the encounter that would haunt both Charlie and Franz for forty years until, as old men, they would seek out one another and reunite.
Ratings and reviews
4.7
89 reviews
Simon Moore
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December 5, 2016
This is an incredible telling of not only an amazing act that spared lives, but of how war really is for those involved. Two men born thousands of miles apart, destined to meet to yards from each other in the open skies of ww2 Germany. Fantastic reading
RIATfan 0100
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February 20, 2014
It is definitely in the top 3 books I have ever read, couldn't put it down. Lent it to my dad to see if he liked it and after the first chapter, he had decided to buy it.
3 people found this review helpful
Dave Bunting
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October 10, 2015
Amazing read. The author makes you feel like you know the crews and pilots personally. Well written, and researched beyond doubt.
6 people found this review helpful
About the author
Adam Makos is a journalist, historian and editor of the military magazine, Valor. Makos has interviewed countless veterans from WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and present-day wars. In 2008 Makos travelled to Iraq to accompany the 101st Airborne and Army Special Forces on their hunt for Al Qaeda terrorists.
Larry Alexander is the author of the New York Times bestselling biography Biggest Brother: The Life of Major Dick Winters, the Man Who Led the Band of Brothers. He is also the author of Shadows In the Jungle: The Alamo Scouts Behind Japanese Lines in World War II and In the Footsteps of the Band of Brothers: A Return to Easy Company's Battlefields With Sgt. Forrest Guth.
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