If you own the first edition you will be buying Volume Four to cover the Bombers which are now noticeably absent. (It’s okay. Spend the money, you’ll be happy you did.)
Massively rewritten and revised, this is essentially a new standalone volume and not a revised edition.
This new volume has approximately 15% more pages than the 2004 addition and as mentioned above deletes the bombers. The book is very comprehensive in covering British fighter development in terms of single engine, multi-engine, turret fighter (Chapter 5 is titled “Turrey Fighters and Night Fighters”.) Naval fighters, etc.
Because the scope includes up to 1950, some Naval “fighters” such as the Blackburn Firebrand and the Westland Wyvern which have traditionally been relegated to foot notes in other books receive excellent coverage here under a heading of “Strike Fighter”.
One chapter has been included to provide cursory coverage of engine, propeller, and other technology developments including a few interesting pictures of raw compressor forgings, propeller manufacturing, etc. It is probably the weakest chapter in the book and the reader would be better off finding other sources if they want to know more.
Of the appendices, Appendix One British Fighter Projects Summary will probably of the most interest due to its coverage of projects by the small and “also ran” firms such as Airspeed, Folland, and Martin-Baker. This appendix also includes a few line drawings of some these proposed aircraft.
Overall? This book is lavishly illustrated with photographs, line drawings, brochure art, and photographs of a few manufacturer style models. (Some are contemporary scratch-built.) The text does an excellent job of describing each aircraft and does so in a manner that gives the reader an understanding of the various factors and circumstances that were driving each development such as engineering or manufacturing resources, lack of materials, etc. My only disappointment was coverage of some of the ad-hoc Fleet Air Arm fighters such as the Sea Gladiator and Sea Hurricane were noticeable by their absence.
Highly recommended without reservation and a must buy for anyone interested in British aircraft from the interwar to post-war period. ( )

What’s particularly valuable about the book is how Buttler relates those projects not built with the machines that actually went into production. As for my favorite chapters, those were either the ones dealing with bombers, or the one concerning turret fighters. In the first case there’s a whole range of projects roughly comparable to the B-29, B-32 or B-36 that didn’t come together or which were overtaken by events. In the second case one has to be amazed that such a marginal concept absorbed so much time and energy. Also, one comes to the conclusion that the British were fortunate to come up with such successful heavy fighters as the Mosquito or the Beaufighter, seeing as they couldn't produce a North American B-25 or Martin B-26 equivalent. ( )