BARTLETT, NORMAN — Island Victory

Australia, Angus & Robertson. 1955, 1st. Hardcover with dust jacket, 20.5cm. Book, 166pp & less than 500g to post. Name removed top right corner 1st p. Bartlett was somewhat snobbish about authors who wrote luridly illustrated paperbacks, a case of judging a book by its cover. Anyway here is his novelisation of war in the Pacific, Island Victory > "The events in this book all happened. It is only fiction in so far as events have been rearranged into a coherent pattern." The action is set in 1944 in New Guinea and on Kamiri island - a Dutch possession to the north. An Australian Kittyhawk squadron recaptures Kamiri with US support. The action is mostly in the personalities and thoughts of the characters. There's some interesting absence of regard for the indigenous peoples swept up into this conflict. Good/Fair.