Military Model Scene

Title: The CAC Boomerang
Author: Don Williams
Publisher: Avonmore
ISBN: 978-0-97564-232-0

Australia's own WW2 Fighter, a new title from Avonmore Books, and with illustrations by Michael Claringbould. A 104-page soft-cover book.
CAC, the Commonwealth Aircraft Company took on the task of building the only Australian designed and built fighter in WW2, the Boomerang. Spread over 11 chapters, this tells the story of that aircraft, of which 250 were built during the war. The story starts with the politics of it for Australia, who needed a fighter of their own, just in case supplies of any others from the USA or the UK were interrupted. The design quickly went through the stages to get to production, and into service. As well as that history, there is good detail on the design and construction of the aircraft, including armament, powerplant etc. There is a chart showing how production lagged behind the planned rate, but it was used. Initially it was used as a fighter with 3 home defence squadrons, intercepting aircraft approaching the Australian coast. Its' performance was not as good an aircraft it was expected to fight, such as the Japanese Zero, which could outperform the Boomerang. All the same, it went on to prove itself more capable in the Army Co-operation role, and in the service of numbers 4 and 5 squadrons operating in New Guinea and Bourgainville. It tells us the operational stories of both these squadrons, and some of the pilots who flew them. One of those in 4 squadron was a Pilot Officer John Buckland, though no relation of mine so far as I know. Throughout the book there are plenty of archive photos, along with some of the fine colour artwork profiles from Michael Claringbould.
I remember my first awareness of the Buffalo came when I was a young lad, and building the Airfix 1/72 kit when it was first released. I was fascinated to discover more about the aircraft thanks to this book, the politics behind it as well as the technical details of the airframe, its' operational history plus background on some of those pilots who flew the aircraft during the war. There is a helpful assessment of the Boomerang in the final chapter, and it does have an appendix which is a table listing a summary of air combat engagements.
Thanks to the UK Distributor for Avonmore, Script Publisher Services (formally Casemate UK), for the review copy.

Robin