As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Affiliate disclosure.

Home / Series / Manner of Men

Series

Manner of Men

The Manner of Men series follows the fictional airborne soldier Sean Harris and his comrades through the final year of the Second World War in Europe. Operation Codicil begins with British airborne operations on D-Day; Target Arnhem moves the team into Operation Market Garden; In For The Kill continues in the Netherlands after Arnhem; The Lost Patrol shifts to the Battle of the Bulge; and Varsity brings the unit to the Rhine crossing in March 1945.

McKay originally conceived the sequence as a shorter series, but later extended it beyond the first three books. The recurring soldiers and their special missions are fictional, while the novels are deliberately embedded in documented campaigns, units, weapons and operational conditions. The series is therefore best read in numerical order even though each mission has its own immediate plot.

Reading order

Books in this series (5 books)

Operation Codicil cover

1. Operation Codicil

John R. McKay

3.9(44)

On the night before D-Day, Sergeant Sean Harris and a group of British airborne pathfinders fly towards Normandy as the first troops of the invasion prepare to land. Their fictional mission centres on securing a strategically important bridge over the River Orne, but a disrupted drop…

Target Arnhem cover

2. Target Arnhem

John R. McKay

4.4(77)

September 1944. During Operation Market Garden, Sergeant Sean Harris and a small team of paratroopers are sent into the Arnhem area to recover a Dutch scientist hiding with the Resistance. The scientist carries information about a German facility connected to a new synthetic fuel for the…

In for the Kill cover

3. In for the Kill

John R. McKay

4.0(19)

Holland, October 1944. Barely more than a week after escaping the Arnhem fighting, Sean Harris and the survivors of his team are ordered back behind German lines. Documents recovered during the previous mission point to a secret facility producing synthetic fuel intended to extend the operational…

The Lost Patrol cover

4. The Lost Patrol

John R. McKay

4.0(9)

Belgium, December 1944. As the German Ardennes offensive breaks through American positions, Lieutenant Sean Harris and his men are caught in a rapidly changing battlefield. A routine visit leaves senior officers stranded behind enemy lines, and when further men sent to retrieve them disappear, Harris turns…

Varsity cover

5. Varsity

John R. McKay

4.0(6)

Germany, March 1945. Lieutenant Sean Harris and his veteran paratroopers take part in Operation Varsity, the major Allied airborne assault supporting the crossing of the Rhine. When the fictional group’s mission collapses and several men are captured, Harris, Harry McGuinness and Len Dunleavy must escape through…