Basically, Abducting a General is the other half, or alternate view, of the General Kreipe abduction on Crete in the first half of 1944. Paddy Leigh Fermor and Billy Moss were the British officers in charge and it the initial proposal was Paddy's, developing a much vaguer idea mooted to him by Xan Fielding. Paddy was a major, senior to and older than Captain Billy Moss but it was Moss who had the big success with his account, Ill Met by Moonlight (reviewed earlier on this blog). Fermor was himself a literary man but held off writing his account until thirty years or so after Billy's death. It was partly published in a WW2 magazine and went largely unnoticed. This version, published by John Murray in 2014, after Paddy too had died, is a reconstruction from the papers he left behind, with helpful introductory notes and extremely useful reports from the field retrieved from the War Office.
The facts don't alter - after all, Paddy was involved with Moss's books and indeed most other accounts. He translated The Cretan Runner into English and was a source for Antony Beevor's scholarly account which in turn has deep reciprocal links with the works of Beevor's wife, Artemis Cooper, whose biography of Fermor and study of wartime Cairo are both reviewed on this blog. What makes Paddy's account different is persepective. He lived a very long life and had time for the deepest reflection. For much of the time he and Moss were on Crete in 1944 they operated separately, Moss escorting the abducted General while Fermor hurried everywhere across the island meeting contacts and other agents, all of whom he knew, whereas Moss knew none.
In terms of describing the action, Moss is probably the better read. In terms of understanding the machinations of the Special Operations Executive and the sheer courage of the Cretan resistance, I prefer this.
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