I have been researching and working on this story for some time. It is now in skeletal form. Before I sit down to the hard bit I would appreciate any thoughts or comments on the folowing synopsis and introduction.


Charon

‘The commandant stood at the edge of the ancient stone dock in Chania, looking out over a black sea to the harbour mouth. He threw his glowing cheroot into the gently lapping Mediterranean. As he turned to walk towards the sentries, clicking to attention at his Head-quarters, the hiss from the cigar extinguishing was matched with another as the hunting arrow sped through the air to plunge deep into his back.- - - - - - -’

Thus opens Charon - a thriller set in occupied Crete during World War 2.

It tells a story of heroism ‘against all the odds’ through the eyes of a young Greek boy who adopts the pseudonym Charon - the Greek mythological ferryman of the dead. Charon, single-handedly, wages his own resistance war against the German and Italian forces who have brutally occupied his island and turned it into an Axis fortress between Europe and Africa.
The opening tells of the assassination of the enemy‘s Commander. It then takes us back to the air-borne invasion of Crete in 1942 - The first large-scale, air-borne invasion of enemy held territory in history. Charon, a 17 year old schoolboy, is at school trying hard to concentrate on his lessons while his mind is still mourning the loss of both parents on the mainland due to the German invasion of Greece.
He and his school-mates rush outside at the sound of bombs and gunfire to see a sky, black with falling paratroops and gliders. When the Germans kill his Grandparents in a reprisal execution, Charon swears his campaign of vengeance which causes increasing terror to the occupying forces.
It ends when Charon, now nearing 50, watches a German Countess open the cemetery for her own families' war-dead to lie with their 4,500 comrades having been at last granted permission by the Cretan people, 32 years after the end of the war. She is reminded that not all have forgotten or forgiven.

The book is a novel set in wartime designed to appeal to all lovers of thrillers and readers of war chronicles. ‘Charon’ melds a fictional story with war-time, historical detail. It commemorates the bravery of those Cretans who, supported by the Allies, fought a fierce resistance war against the latest invaders of their beloved island. This is remembered every 28th October, ’Ochi Day,’ when throughout Greece and her islands people gather to remember this and other famous struggles and celebrate their hard-won independence.

The Author has visited the island, the invasion ground, famous war-time sites, war museum and graveyards and has researched the story of this crucial Air-borne invasion which was one of the pivotal points that lead to the demise of Hitler’s ambitions.

Ian MacMillan 453 words