This is my first time reading Neal Bascomb and he offers so much of what I want in a book. I love historical novels, fiction or non-fiction, that are well researched and are well written. I enjoyed learning about aviation during WWI through the multiple story lines and rich character development. Will look for more books by Bascomb in the future. Thanks!

This is the story of British POW’s in Germany during WWI. The book follows a group of British aviators thru various prisoner of war camps, eventually to the notorious Holzminden prison. The “ tunnelers of Holzminden” eventually mount a grand escape in which 29 men attempted breach the wall. The run for the Dutch border
makes for page turning reading. Many books have been written on this subject, and this one makes good use of them as well as archives, personal letters, interviews and articles. It is extremely well researched and meticulously footnoted. Thank you to Netgalley and Houghton, Mifflin and Harcourt for allowing me to read this advance copy.

“Any successful escape... would need to be a four-stage event: intense preparation, a foolproof breakout, an evasion scheme, and a bid to cross the border.’

From getting shot down in dogfights to being caught spying in the trenches, prisoners were rounded up in a multitude of ways. And once locked up in camps, many tried to escape and were recaptured over and over again; the resolve to get home never wavered. Neal Bascomb’s The Escape Artists is the griping story of ten British airmen’s ingenious prison break from German hands in WW1.

The story is broken up into four parts: the mens’ captures, their transfer to the notorious Holzminden camp (nicknamed Hellminden), the development of the plan, and the escape itself. For a rather short book, Bascomb covers a lot of important background information, including the history of the treatment of prisoners and the Hague conventions and the several key prison escapes throughout the ages. Some of the most enlightening passages include the highs of comraderie and depressing lows of separation from family. As much as they banded together on the field of battle, they worked to free themselves from the treatment of awful camp directors and make their way to Holland.

The Escape Artists can easily be envisioned as ready for the big screen. The author builds up the story with painstakingly researched details of the fliers lives before the war, imprisoned, and the reunions decades afterwards. The book joins Bascomb’s other great pieces of wartime nonfiction, and rivals Hampton Side’s Ghost Soldiers as one of the best accounts of POW escape.

Thank you to NetGalley, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and Neal Bascomb for an advanced copy for review.

This story combines several areas of interest; early aviators, World War I, tales of daring-do, and larger than life heroes. And it's all true. In The Escape Artists, author Neal Bascombe weaves together the stories of WW I soldiers and aviators, and the Germans who imprisoned them. The multiple story lines, the characters who move through various prison camps, and daring failed attempts, and finally the mass escape of British POWs is told compellingly. My only wish was for more maps, more photos, more diagrams to illustrate the book.