Derek Robinson Books in Order

An early practical guide to rugby union, this book breaks down the basics of how the game is played. Robinson writes for people who want the skills, shape, and flow of rugby made plain.

A straightforward introduction to rugby union fundamentals, covering the skills and team play that make the game work. It is aimed at readers who want a clearer grasp of what happens on the pitch and why.

On the Western Front in 1918, Major Stanley Woolley drives his pilots hard because he expects most of them to die. It is savage, funny, and merciless about the gap between air-war legend and daily survival.

This compact Bristle book plays translator for Bristol speech, explaining what locals say and what they really mean. It is part dialect guide, part affectionate joke, and part civic in-joke.

Robinson returns to Bristol dialect with more local phrases, pronunciations, and jokes for outsiders to puzzle over. It is another short, comic guide to the way Bristle talks.

A slim Bristol-flavoured comic collection, this book mixes wordplay, local humor, and sharp little observations. It shows Robinson's fondness for the city's voice long before his histories of Bristol appeared.

Written against a tide of civic self-congratulation, this short history digs into Bristol's rougher record. Slavery, corruption, riots, and official bungling all get their turn.

British intelligence needs a way to ruin Mikhail Starin, a ruthless Soviet spymaster in London. Their plan falls to David Hale, an honorable young man who is badly out of his depth in a cold and cynical game.

Washed ashore on occupied Jersey in 1944, American airman Earl Kramer wants to keep fighting. The islanders, who survive by uneasy compromise with the Germans, see him as a walking disaster.

In neutral Spain in 1941, quick-witted Luis Cabrillo builds a fake spy network and sells invented intelligence to the Germans. The lies pay well, but once the war machine starts trusting him, every bluff becomes harder to survive.

Hornet Squadron goes from the Phoney War to the Battle of Britain, learning that swagger and patriotism are no match for bad tactics and real losses. Robinson keeps the flying vivid and the mythology firmly on the ground.

Robinson races through about 150 years of rugby history, mixing knowledge of the game with a light, witty touch. It is a lively overview of how rugby grew, changed, and argued with itself.

Robinson examines Britain's atomic tests in Australia and the Pacific through documents, testimony, and grim official logic. It is an angry, readable account of secrecy, fallout, and the servicemen who paid the price.

This book looks at the Bristol and District Rugby Football Combination and the club world around it. It is local rugby history, focused on the people, institutions, and traditions that kept the game going.

Another brisk visit to Bristle speech, this volume adds more local sayings, jokes, and verbal quirks. It is best read with an ear for Bristol voices and a willingness to laugh out loud.

Fresh from school in 1916, Oliver Paxton reaches Hornet Squadron and finds fear, drink, bravado, and sudden death waiting in France. Robinson turns his arrival into a brutal coming-of-age story inside the Royal Flying Corps.

British intelligence brings Luis Cabrillo to England to manage the imaginary network that fooled the Germans. As he adds more nonexistent agents and bigger claims, the con threatens to spin beyond anyone's control.

In North Africa in 1942, Hornet Squadron, an SAS raiding party, and a determined Luftwaffe officer move toward the same fight. The result is a dusty, funny, hard-edged war novel about competing plans and flawed people.

Robinson maps out greener corners of Bristol with practical routes and parking advice. It is a handy walking guide for readers who want the city's open spaces as well as its streets.

This compact Bristol history heads straight for the city's violent, scandalous, and uncomfortable stories. Robinson prefers the awkward truth to civic myth, and tells it with speed and bite.

A later helping of Bristol dialect, full of local expressions, comic mistranslations, and the odd lesson in how the accent works. It keeps the Bristle joke alive without needing a long introduction.

Hornet Squadron fights on through 1917 as new machines arrive and losses keep coming. Robinson follows the pilots through another grinding year of patrols, accidents, and combat, where experience helps, but never guarantees survival.

This all-in-one Bristle glossary gathers Bristol words and phrases, helped along by cartoons and examples. If the local speech has ever baffled you, this is the translation manual.

Young bomber crews join the RAF expecting adventure and find chaos, weak aircraft, and grim odds over Germany. Robinson follows 409 Squadron through the early bombing war with gallows humor and no false heroics.

In Rock Springs, Kentucky, two families start a feud that stretches across generations. Robinson turns one small town's story, from the 1820s through the Civil War and beyond, into a big, unsentimental American saga.

Robinson charges through centuries of Bristol history in comic local style, turning civic blunders and rough episodes into a mischievous read. It is history with a grin, but the scandals are real enough.

Robinson revisits Bristol's past through stories of slaving, persecution, greed, riot, and civic failure. It is short, sharp, and written to puncture the city's more flattering legends.

Robinson revisits the invasion scare of 1940 and argues that the Battle of Britain did not, by itself, stop Hitler. It is a brisk, revisionist look at the air war, Operation Sea Lion, and the Royal Navy's overlooked role.

Luis Cabrillo lands in 1950s America just as McCarthyism turns suspicion into national sport. Robinson turns the hunt for Reds into a sharp espionage tale about paranoia, performance, and political stupidity.

Twice-decorated bomber pilot Silk returns to the RAF in the nuclear age and learns to fly the Vulcan. The enemy has changed, but the tension is still deadly, especially when retaliation means a ruined world.

Luis Cabrillo and Julie Conroy head to Los Angeles and run straight into mob money, dead bodies, and fresh trouble. It is a peacetime caper, but Cabrillo still lives by bluff, nerve, and fast talk.

In 1919, an RAF volunteer squadron heads into the Russian Civil War expecting a brisk sideshow. Instead they find a dirty, bitter campaign where incompetence and brutality make a mockery of the title.

In Italy in 1944, American intelligence latches onto a Vatican source whose reports look almost too good to be true. Robinson builds a wartime thriller out of spies, strategy, and the danger of believing what you want to hear.