Do the Birds Still Sing in Hell?: A powerful true story of love and survival

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Though it was ghost-written by Ken Scott, he stated he literally only acted as Greasley‘s fingers and typing out the book for the latter, aged 89 at the time, was heavily afflicted with arthritis. While Greasley does begin by providing some context for himself and the political climate he was facing at the time, it doesn’t take long for him to begin discussing the rushed preparations he was forced to undertake to join the army. After seven weeks of training, we see him joining with the 2nd/5th Battalion Leicester, and his capture when he found himself facing the might of the German army with nothing but a few rounds in his pouch.

Now, I certainly don’t want to undermine the author’s daring exploits, but if you were looking for something to rival The Great Escape I may have to disappoint you. It wasn’t an entirely uncommon practice to bunk out of prisoner camps the way he did, and for the most part they weren’t the tightly-guarded fortresses depicted in movies.

Forgotten the title or the author of a book? Our BookSleuth is specially designed for you. Visit BookSleuth Do the Birds Sing in Hell? by Horace Greasley is yet another fascination World War II memoir, detailing a young British man’s journey into the hell of the Wehrmacht and the bits of solace he found along the way. This is billed as a memoir. The author claims he’s only telling the story of Horace Greasley. At times I didn’t get that feeling especially when conversations took place with their captors. I was also trying to figure out if this is a story about a Englishman who is captured in France or an attempt at pornography. The lines truly become blurred.

For example, the sex scenes were very graphic and didn’t fit with the mood of the book at all- it was kind of like reading a cheap romance novel. The size of Horace’s penis was bragged about around 3 times- each time more random than the first! In the world of literature, I think it’s safe to say we’ve gone pretty deep in terms of memoirs from the Second World War, in the sense we got many different approaches and outlooks on various aspects of this historical period.Horace was a sexually driven man, from his accounts, I believe he loved to love and be loved. To remove this characteristic from the plot line and character of Horace would’ve been dehumanising for him, as it is an essential component of the book. Horace himself doesn’t sound much like a contemporary “hero” or even a gentleman in many cases, his lust for sex is clear and these scenes are vivid and descriptive. The author said people tell him all the time about "great stories" he should write. Someone told him about Horace, and he thought, I'll talk to the old codger, see what he has to say, humor him. Then was riveted for hours by the story and decided to write it. The incredible true story of how of one British soldier escaped a prisoner war camp 200 times to see the girl he loved. I completed this book as it was a book club challenge, but never have I forced myself on through a book so unwillingly. I can’t believe someone’s planning to make a film about this!

Horace Greasley escaped over 200 times from a notorious German prison camp to see the girl he loved. This is his incredible true story.I appreciate that the writer wrote it acting ‘as the fingers of’ the fruity old story teller, but in my view it would have been kinder to the teller’s (now) memory, and that of his contemporaries, not to mention ‘his’ women, to put it through some serious editing. Do The Birds Still Sing In Hell?: He Escaped over 200 Time from a Notorious German Prison Camp to See the Girl He Loved. This Is the Incredible Story of Horace Greasley It’s hard to know if an editor even glanced at this novel or they had adjectival dyslexia, considering the constant tedium, clunky sentences, and repetitive conversations. Instead of allowing the reader to assume that the two people in the scene are in-fact talking to one another, each has to sign off with the other’s name: ‘Can I have a haircut Jim?’, ‘Yes you can Flapper’. ‘How are you Jim?’ ‘I am good Flapper’. Gripping stuff. Again, considering that he was a PoW, I would have thought that he would have had bigger concerns than whether his penis (the biggest in the camp - thanks for the constant reminder 🙄) still worked 🤷🏼‍♀️ The first time Horace has sex with Rose (the love of his life and the reason he started escaping over 200 times).... it's rape. She says, "No. Stop. We'll get caught." and whether that last line means she wants to but is afraid to get caught or not, the first two words make it rape. AND he even says he was raping her.