Night Drop at Ede

Lance K. LeRay was editor, BAR Magazine, Toronto.

This book will appeal to two kinds of people: 1) those who like a good adventure story; and 2) those with historical interest in World War II and specifically the resistance movement against Nazi occupation. Highly exciting events are told without melodramatic embellishment, yet nerve-racking situations are vividly recounted. While working on a German ship, Len Mulholland is acting as a courier for Dutch freedom fighters. British bombers attack the convoy, and if Mulholland’s ship goes down, so does the vital message he is carrying. In another episode, Len Mulholland and his group are gathering supplies being dropped by Allied aircraft. Local villagers observe the parachutes and believe a liberating force is descending from the sky. Obviously, and ironically, their cheering makes the gathering of supplies rather ticklish for the freedom fighters. In another fascinating chapter, Mulholland’s assignment is to blow up German ships in the New Waterway Canal, which connects the harbor of Rotterdam with the North Sea. This is accomplished by a night swim through cold filthy water in order to attach limpet mines to the vessels. This true story takes you from the Nazi invasion of the Netherlands (when Len Mulholland is a student at the Merchant Navy College in Amsterdam) to the time German soil is penetrated by Allied soldiers. Mulholland’s treatment by suspicious American officers who initially refuse to believe his story makes a tense ending to a great read.