DAWN ATTACK by Callison, Brian

New York, 1973, Putnam's, first US edition, hard bound in dust jacket, 5 1/2 x 8 1/2, VG/VG CONDITION ( very light dj edge wear ), 287 pages, 1 map..................................................................In the predawn darkness of November 29, 1941, a fleet of warships Toyed silently toward the Nazi outpost on Alvik, Norway, a tiny fishing port of strategic importance, whose military population was that morning more concerned with a warm breakfast than with the possibilities of impending attack. Ashore was a varied garrison: Herr Major Doring, lifetime officer in the German army and visiting dignitary at the post, unsure of his present Führer and weary of war; Leutnant Sur See Rex, senior officer at Alvik, struggling to establish himself in the Nazi superrace; Soldat Kruger, to whom war was a movie made by Errol Flynn; pilot Paul Fichte, doomed to die at the hands either of the British or of the SS. And aboard the ships was an equally diverse task force: Norwegian nationals, bound to regain their homeland; Captain Michael Seely, who found the day a macabre way to celebrate his twenty-sixth birthday; Arthur Henderson, whose fierce desire to avenge the deaths of his wife and children in an air raid in the end would not translate into the fighting spirit of a Commando.