The basis of the Sven Hassel style is all here, more so than in The Legion Of The Damned, and we get to meet Tiny and the Little Legionnaire. All the trademarks are used - brothels, firing squads, tanks, gambling, drinking, retreating.

And don't forget Porta's wonderful recipe for Mashed Potatoes with Diced Pork.

Wheels Of Terror was made into a film in 1988. It is also the only Sven Hassel novel with a confirmed German translation (Austrian edition 'Die Galgen-Vogel' literally 'The Gallows Birds'). Here's some information from Terry (who owns it - lucky bastard!):-

'There's a funky photo of the author on the back of the dustjacket in which he looks very beatnik - a rather simian beard, close cropped black hair, wearing a pair of Wayfarers. It was published in '65. I guess the big teaser on the cover of the English copy of Wheels of Terror: "The book no German publisher dared print" is still accurate in that this was published in Austria. There is a dedication: "Dieses Buch ist den drei grossten Galgenvolgeln des 27. Panzerregiments, Joseph Porta, Gorilla, und dem Legionar, gewidmet", basically "This book is dedicated to the greatest Galgenvogeln (I guess "gallows-birds" is accurate) of the 27th Panzer Regiment...."

One must assume that Tiny here is Gorilla. Interestingly, a list of the titles under which the book has been published gives "Wheels of Terror" as the American title and "Paladin and Panzer" as the English title. Perhaps somewhere out there is a copy of "Paladin"! So far I can't find a translator credited. Presumably Sven would have pretty much mastered the German language during years in the Wehrmacht, so theoretically he could have done the job. Somehow, though, I doubt it. Who would want to rewrite one's own book in another language? There is a forward from the man himself - I don't think it contains any startling revelations, but it is interesting in that it is the first time I've seen any such 'words from the author' in a Sven Hassel book - besides the text itself, of course. There's not much room for all that in a paperback.

The essence of the forward is: 'two decades have passed since the end of WWII. I lived through the terror of this war.' He goes on to recount how the disappointing economic situation in Denmark led him to seek work in Germany, and then to join the Army, which seemed terrific at first, but then the war came. (I believe it's in "Liquidate Paris" that he tells this bit of personal history). He says 'I became a Fahnenjunker, later a Panzeroffizier, and saw Germany as my Fatherland. But as I came to know more, I saw that our Idealism was misused and we had been cheated, deceived and betrayed'.

He also says 'people ask me whether I could write on any Theme other that the war, and I tell them that I could, but I don't want to. I see it as my task to describe to another generation a life of only unemployment, war, and hunger.'