Night Fighters by Bill Gunston (Sutton £25)

SUTTON has cornered the military history market in recent years and this latest offering maintains the standard that we have come to expect.

Spanning the last 90 years of flight - basically the history of the technology - this book leaves the runway as a biplane and later lands as a flying projectile bristling with hi-tech.

The story begins with the British aviator armed with a rifle, freezing in his cockpit high above the shattered wastes of the Western Front.

Along the way, we explore the stop-go research of the inter-war years, and then witness the increasing pace of development that preceded the Second World War.

From 1939 onwards, the blend of improved design, ever-more sophisticated radar systems combine to form the templates of the future that will produce machines of increasingly bizarre appearance and capabilities.

This is a well-written history, the text neatly punctuated with some aviation shots guaranteed to set any self-respecting aircraft anorak's mouth watering.

It's an absolute must for the bookshelf. John Phillpott