Derring-dos of the SAS mavericks – author Damien Lewis in Stratford for literary festival

MAJOR Blair ‘Paddy’ Mayne sounds like an action hero invented by Hollywood. But in his new book SAS Forged in Hell, bestselling author and military historian Damien Lewis brings the Commander of the SAS and the most decorated British soldier, gloriously to life.

The book is full of jaw-dropping accounts of derring-do as it plots the journey of the SAS led by Mayne through Europe in 1943. He and his men had been ordered to fight their way through the most heavily defended enemy shoreline to help the Allied advance in leading the way to liberate occupied Europe from the Nazis.

“What I like about the SAS is you are talking about people who are fighting the good fight for all the right reasons: to defeat a greater evil,” Damien told the Herald ahead of his appearance at the Stratford Literary Festival on Sunday (29th October).