Ben Macintyre [is] a master storyteller ... It is a thrilling saga, breathtakingly told, full of daring and heroes; imaginative, even audacious, tactics; evocative code names; nighttime raids; and explosions across two continents ... One of the many virtues of this volume, broken into two sections, is the surprising small asides tucked into these pages, tiny truths that give the book depth along with derring-do.
...a rumbustious, polychromatic group portrait ... One of the remarkable aspects of Macintyre’s authorized-if-not-official history is that he keeps a cool hand on the theatrics while maintaining an edge-of-the-seat narrative ... little intimacies lighten tales burdened by scenes of death and carnage.
...what details Macintyre has gleaned from these dusty diaries and photographs! Even minor characters bristle with life ... This is a book about war, and some chapters make for uneasy reading ... Macintyre has produced yet another wonderful book.
This is a book for readers of second world war history who like the Boy’s Own version of the conflict. The cast of characters could have stepped straight from a comic strip story ... The history needs scarcely any embellishment, though he tells it with flair: the simple facts of SAS activity make the 'ripping yarns' of comic book heroes pale by comparison ... Rogue Heroes is a great read of wartime adventuring, in a long, grim war of attrition where adventure was hard to find.
...reads like a mashup of The Dirty Dozen and The Great Escape, with a sprinkling of Ocean’s 11 thrown in for good measure ... Mr. Macintyre draws sharp, Dickensian portraits of these men and displays his usual gifts here for creating a cinematic narrative that races along ... Mr. Macintyre is masterly in using details to illustrate his heroes’ bravery, élan and dogged perseverance ... Mr. Macintyre has difficulty zooming out from his heroes’ story to give a broader understanding of how their operational work fit into the larger canvas of the war.
This is hardly the first time the S.A.S. story has been told but Rogue Heroes is the best and most complete version of the tale ... [a] highly enjoyable and entertaining narrative.
Rogue Heroes is a terrific story of human enterprise, endurance and achievement and vividly brings to life an extraordinary cast of characters ... But he is not detached enough. Contemporary criticisms of the SAS as undisciplined adventurers beyond the control of senior commanders are dismissed as carping rather than fully explored. Rogue Heroes also overstates the newness and significance of what the SAS achieved ... Rogue Heroes is an absorbing story of derring-do, told with skill and flair. But it is not the groundbreaking account that it claims to be.
