Townend, William The Three Brothers.

A work of fiction from quite late in Townend’s writing career, The Three Brothers looks at the effects of World War 2 on the lives of three brothers and on the girl that all three had loved. The novel’s turning point comes with a powerful description of the sinking of a troop transport (a former freighter named KILMORACK) while traveling in an Atlantic convoy from England to Gibraltar. The novel’s heroine (Jennie Landrail) is aboard the freighter, en route with other Women’s Auxiliary Air Force (W.A.A.F.) personnel to a Mediterranean posting. Townend’s description of the KILMORACK’s final moments as well as Jennie’s survival at sea in a small rubber life-raft is riveting. By focusing on his first-rate war-at-sea descriptions today’s reader may be able to ignore the anti-Catholic plot devices that often threaten to derail the novel.