Best WW2 Related Book You Have Read

And take an advice, don't read "Mein Kampf". It's a boring, biased and poorly written book, full of unfounded beliefs and 'facts' sustained by prejudiceful judgement. Get any good biography about Adolf Hitler, most particulary Sir Ian Kershaw's two-volume "Hitler" and you'll get a much better picture of the Führer's ideas and contradictions.

Agree! What a totally boring and sensless book. Written by sick man


I heard a new book about Monte Cassino has been just published. But dont remember author

 

Originally posted by STEVEN+Apr 9 2004, 06:23 PM-->(STEVEN @ Apr 9 2004, 06:23 PM)</div><div class='quotemain'> <!--QuoteBegin-Will O'Brien@Apr 7 2004, 04:37 PM

From what I understand the only Sven Hassel book with any thread of truth in it was 'Legion of the Damed'....................All the others are pure fiction & some were even ghost written & Old Sven's name put to them purely to make them more marketable.
[/b]
Thats explains why they were nearly all killed off in the first book,yet kept appearing in all the the following books.Tried explaining this to a big fan of Sven's who swore they were all true,but he wouldn't have it.

Even if they were fiction as a story goes i think they were all pretty good,with one or two exceptions (SS General springs to mind).

Steven
i'm one of the sven hassel's fans and i must to say that i disagree with you. sven hassel is possibly alieve (info from 2002...), and i think that he wouldn't let that happen.

 

Originally posted by strangelove+Jun 2 2004, 01:13 AM-->(strangelove @ Jun 2 2004, 01:13 AM)</div><div class='quotemain'> Originally posted by STEVEN@Apr 9 2004, 06:23 PM
<!--QuoteBegin-Will O'Brien@Apr 7 2004, 04:37 PM

From what I understand the only Sven Hassel book with any thread of truth in it was 'Legion of the Damed'....................All the others are pure fiction & some were even ghost written & Old Sven's name put to them purely to make them more marketable.

Thats explains why they were nearly all killed off in the first book,yet kept appearing in all the the following books.Tried explaining this to a big fan of Sven's who swore they were all true,but he wouldn't have it.

Even if they were fiction as a story goes i think they were all pretty good,with one or two exceptions (SS General springs to mind).

Steven
i'm one of the sven hassel's fans and i must to say that i disagree with you. sven hassel is possibly alieve (info from 2002...), and i think that he wouldn't let that happen. [/b]Not too sure what you mean by this............Wouldn't let what happen?

 

Originally posted by STEVEN@Apr 7 2004, 06:01 PM
Something i totally forgot about when i posted the original thread.What about all those countless books by Sven Hassell.

I was rumaging through some books at a second hand book stall and came across "Legion of the Damned".It reminded me i'd actually red quite a few of his books some years ago,but not having seen one for some years i'd forgot all about him.

Steven
I read quite a lot of Sven Hassell's books in the 70’s when I was a young bloke and thought they were a great READ. From what I can remember they were a great read and a bit of escapism, I read them for what they were – a novel.

I will have to start reading them again.

Good work Sven

spider

 

Originally posted by BetinhoPL@May 8 2004, 05:55 AM
And take an advice, don't read "Mein Kampf". It's a boring, biased and poorly written book, full of unfounded beliefs and 'facts' sustained by prejudiceful judgement. Get any good biography about Adolf Hitler, most particulary Sir Ian Kershaw's two-volume "Hitler" and you'll get a much better picture of the Führer's ideas and contradictions.

Agree! What a totally boring and sensless book. Written by sick man


I heard a new book about Monte Cassino has been just published. But dont remember author

Couldn't agree more.Someone bought me a copy of this one Christmas and was quiet looking forward to reading it.Just to see how the mans mind worked what made him tick.

I lasted about 100 pages and then gave up,very disapointed.My copy ended up in a charity shop !!.

Stephen

 

Originally posted by spider@Jun 2 2004, 05:58 PM
From what I can remember they were a great read and a bit of escapism, I read them for what they were – a novel.

I will have to start reading them again.

Good work Sven

spider


This is how i treated them.Generally as war stories goes MOST of them were pretty good.Some of the descriptions of the fighting in the deapths of a Russian winter were brilliant and you could see just how hellish it might have been/was.

It was just the one friend i had, who insisted they were fact and it didn't matter how many times you pointed the varoius inconsistancies etc,out to him he just wouldn't have it any other way.

Stephen

 

Originally posted by Will O'Brien@Jun 2 2004, 11:37 PM
Not too sure what you mean by this............Wouldn't let what happen?
let somebody other write rest of his books...

 

John Toland's, The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire and Carlo D'este, Bitter Victory. Both these books are excellent.

 

I feel that the one of the best accounts of the of the turbulent history of Europe in the interwar years is related by William L Shirer's "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. A History of Nazi Germany".

 

Hello Steven,

With so many variables one finds it difficult to specifically answer the question posed. From books covering the war as a whole, combatants,
arms of service, theatres, battles, units participating, to individual actions/accounts, my choice is two from the last mentioned category

Oluf Reed Olson's "Two eggs on my plate" - a riveting account of the author's adventures in occupied Norway. Interesting was the habit of serving two eggs for breakfast to agents slated for inserting into Europe.

Bruce Marshall's "White Rabbit"- the story of the man who the Gestapo failed to break.

Gerry

 

Interesting was the habit of serving two eggs for breakfast to agents slated for inserting into Europe.



because they were normally droped by one of the special use squadrons and therefore would be entitled to operational rations eg fresh eggs! if they came back the same way then they would have received two eggs as well!!


:ph34r: :ph34r:

 

Originally posted by Harry Ree@Jul 23 2004, 09:39 AM
I feel that the one of the best accounts of the of the turbulent history of Europe in the interwar years is related by William L Shirer's "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. A History of Nazi Germany".
I personally find Shirer's book quite good for the period up to America's entry into the war because of his position as a close observer of events and diarist, being a US correspondent in Berlin. I think, though, that it is much more superficial after that. No bad for the rise, therefore, not so good for the fall. Shirer's "testimony" as a witness gives his work power, not his rather weaker qualities of analysis. None the less, this is an important work in the historiography of Nazi Germany and influenced many readers in the 1960s.

Three much better books on the 3rd Reich, in my opinion, are:

Bracher, Karl Dietrich, The German Dictatorship: The Origins, Structure and Consequences of National Socialism, 1969. This is an interesting fairly early study by a renowned German scholar. Probably a bit dated now.

Burleigh, Michael, The Third Reich, a New History, 2000. A much more modern treatment.

Evans, Richard J, The Coming of the Third Reich, 2003. Evans is fast emerging as the leading modern Anglophone scholar on the Third Reich. This is the first volume of a series which is potentially outstanding.

 

I'm only just getting into the history of wwii but some books I have read and would recommend are:

The Rise & Fall of the Third Reich - William Shirer
Inside the Third Reich - Albert Speer
Flags of Our Fathers - James Bradley
The Longest Day - Cornelius Ryan
A Bridge Too Far - Cornelius Ryan
The Donald Burgett books
Band of Brothers

 

Um, since I have an entire wall of WW2 books, I hardly know where to begin.

I have read too many books on WW2 to have a "best."

My favorite history book is William Manchester's "The Glory and the Dream: A Narrative History of America from 1932-1972," and that has a lot about WW2 and the generation that fought it, so that would have to suffice.

My bibliography of my web page has a lot of my favorites and I am writing notes to assess these works.

 

Originally posted by Kiwiwriter@Aug 27 2004, 07:20 PM
Um, since I have an entire wall of WW2 books, I hardly know where to begin.

I have read too many books on WW2 to have a "best."

My favorite history book is William Manchester's "The Glory and the Dream: A Narrative History of America from 1932-1972," and that has a lot about WW2 and the generation that fought it, so that would have to suffice.

My bibliography of my web page has a lot of my favorites and I am writing notes to assess these works.
[post=27730]Quoted post[/post]

Have you read Manchester's Goodbye, Darkness about his wartime experience?

 

Originally posted by morse1001+Jun 14 2005, 08:10 AM-->(morse1001 @ Jun 14 2005, 08:10 AM)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteBegin-Kiwiwriter@Aug 27 2004, 07:20 PM
Um, since I have an entire wall of WW2 books, I hardly know where to begin.

I have read too many books on WW2 to have a "best."

My favorite history book is William Manchester's "The Glory and the Dream: A Narrative History of America from 1932-1972," and that has a lot about WW2 and the generation that fought it, so that would have to suffice.

My bibliography of my web page has a lot of my favorites and I am writing notes to assess these works.
[post=27730]Quoted post[/post]

Have you read Manchester's Goodbye, Darkness about his wartime experience?
[post=35356]Quoted post[/post]
[/b]
Yes, I have, and I can't recommend it too highly. A superb memoir-travelogue. Manchester undertook a voyage of re-discovery, to find the young Marine he had left behind in Okinawa, and went via all the World War II Pacific battlefields. Whether talking about his own experiences in 1944 or 1978, it's fascinating.

The most shocking part of the book is his description of a Marine sergeant who was very proud of being a highly aggressive homosexual. Not something one expects from a Leatherneck.

 

I read Enemy Coast Ahead by guy gibson a few years back and i thought that it was very good book - very interesting to see what it was like for those people flying those bomber missions almost every night

 

I read a good book called The Last Citadel not too long ago. If your interested in the Russian side of WW2 this book is for you, its mostly based around the battle of the Kursk. Its about a father and son tank crew (T-34 tank), its also a view from a German SS Officer, also about the Russian Partisians and the Night Witch Bombers. It definatly catches your attention early on!

 

The most shocking part of the book is his description of a Marine sergeant who was very proud of being a highly aggressive homosexual. Not something one expects from a Leatherneck. blink.gif

maybe as a seaborne solider he had as his watch word "any port in a storm"!

 

my favorite has to be guy sajers "the forgotten soldier"
but the question is, is it fiction ?