Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (Aviation Classics)

Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo is a tightly focused yarn about Ted Lawson’s participation in the Doolittle Raid. In the darkest days of 1942, with fascism on the march everywhere, a handful of pilots flying B-25s from the USS Hornet made a bee-sting raid on Japan. The raid had negligible material impact, but was an important moral boost.

Lawson’s memoir moves swiftly through pilot training, to the raid itself, and then the meat of the book, the long journey home. Severely wounded while ditching his bomber, Lawson’s leg was amputated in China, and he was carried to safety on vehicles ranging from stretchers to trucks.

This book was written for a popular audience, and published in the middle of the war. So it’s limited in scope, but it’s fun and it’s quick.