Looking for some good reading material on World War II. Do any of you have some favorites?

I like all the Stephen Ambrose books on WWII. Also, you might try Jeff Shaara's trilogy. While considered fiction, it is based on real events and real people.... very good reading!

Time for someone to TTT the book thread.

What are you looking for?

For an overview I like John Keegan's history.

Anything by John Toland and Cornelius Ryan is good. Be more specific on a battle, campaign, service, theater or if you want first person accounts and I have many more recommendations.

im looking for any good reads on WWII, I have read Band of Brothers and the Memoirs of Lt. Winters. Im just looking for some new books of any type on the subject to pick up.

This has been discussed quite a bit on this board, but Forgotten Soldier by Guy Sajer is a memoir that reads more like a novel and depicts the hell of fighting on the Eastern Front. I highly recommend that.

We need to get staff to sticky the book thread. I'll see if I can find it.

I read Helmet for My Pillow last year, and am finishing With the Old Breed now. These are by a couple of the guys featured in The Pacific, Leckie and Sledge.

Guadalcanal Diary by Tregaskis

Len Deighton, the spy novelist, served in the Brit military and has written some excellent non fiction on the war. He is particularly good in describing how the weaponry shaped the war, which was real interesting for a person whose military experience of that war consists of listening to my dad and his friends get drunk and talk about their experiences.

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I have read some of his books. Fighter was one about the RAF, particulary during BoB.

Read Prisoner of the Japanese and lets discuss on this board.

C. Ryan and J. Keegan are both good recs. Chester Wilmot's Struggle for Europe wasn't bad either. I have to disagree with this board about Ambrose though. Stringing together page-length quotes with a couple of sentences of commentary doesn't make you a good historian or writer, it just means you employ good assistants.

Here is one for you guys. My wife met Rocky’s son here at A&M several years ago. He was here giving a speech and my wife told him that I would really like the book. He was nice enough to send me a copy. It is a really good read, one of adventure, bravery, ingenuity and much more.

The War Journal of Major Damon "Rocky" Gause: The Firsthand Account of One of the Greatest Escapes of World War II

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One of the most extraordinary tales of American military history -- the true, firsthand account of a World War II soldier's escape from the Bataan Death March in the Philippines, across the enemy-held Pacific in a leaky boat, to freedom in Australia.

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Here is a hometown newspaper story about the book plus some..

http://www.mainstreetnews.com/arch/Features/Gause.html


[This message has been edited by Birddog (edited 1/6/2011 2:21p).]

http://www.amazon.com/Last-100-Days-Tumultuous-Controversial/dp/081296859X
"The Last 100 days" is still one of my favorites

With the Old Breed - Eugene Sledge
Helmet for My Pillow - Robert Leckie
Goodbye, Darkness - William Manchester

The Rising Tide Part 1 of 3
The Steel Wave Part 2 of 3
No Less Than Victory Part 3 of 3
- Jeffrey Shaara

On my List:
Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption - Laura Hillenbrand
-The Pacific
-Band of Brothers-

Hmm, will have to check out 100 days

Vietnam:
We Were Soldiers Once...and Young
We Are Soldiers Still (excellent read)
Matterhorn

its fiction, but web griffin is always entertaining

I thought "The Ghosts of Iwo Jima" by Robert Burrell made some very interesting points. The whole operation may not have been necessary and was a huge waste of resources.

I just finished one called "A Dawn Like Thunder" by Robert Mrazek. It is the true story of Torpedo Squadron 8. One of the men who flew in the squadron went to A&M for a few years. Very good read.

I also highly recommend "The Few" and "Bedford Boys" by Alex Kershaw. "The Few" is about American pilots who fought illegally for the RAF before America got into the war. "Bedford Boys" is about a company of soldiers all from the same town who fought at Omaha Beach.

Those are a few I can think of worth reading.

And so it was with me, brothers and sisters. When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power. - 1 Corinthians 2:1-5

agrams, Read Last 100 Days in high school in the 70s. Gave me life long interest in WWII. Read many books on it, but still my favorite.

Unbroken is excellent, just finished reading it. Highly recommend.

Here are some of my favorites:
"Pegasus Bridge" by Stephen Ambrose
"Given Up For Dead" by Bill Sloan (excellent account of Wake Island)
"The Fall of Berlin" and "Stalingrad" both by Anthony Beevor (He just put one out on D-Day too)



[This message has been edited by JABQ04 (edited 1/18/2011 12:38a).]

Just finished reading "Unbroken". One of the best books ever and Mr. Zamperini is still alive and well at 95 years of age. What a great book.

ordered Unbroken and the Last 100 days. Looking forward to them.

Oba, The Last Samurai.
The Longest Day.
Jeff Shaara's stuff.

Lots of good suggestions

Some fascinating reads from the German soldier perspective that I've read. The Eastern Front was absolutely brutal

-Sniper on the Eastern Front: The Memoirs of Sepp Allerberger
-Blood Red Snow: The Memoirs of a German Soldier on the Eastern Front
-In Deadly Combat: A German Soldier's Memoir of the Eastern Front
-Black Edelweiss: A Memoir of Combat and Conscience by a Soldier of the Waffen-SS
-AT LENINGRAD'S GATES: The Combat Memoirs of a Soldier with Army Group North
-Seven Days in January: With the 6th SS-Mountain Division in Operation NORDWIND

I really liked Army at Dawn by Rick Atkinson. Winston Churchill's the Second World War (abridged) is also a book I read once a year.

Last Stand of the Tin Can Soldiers

+1 Helmet for My Pillow

Just finished Forgotten Soldier, by Guy Sajer and have to add this one to my list!!

Shattered Sword - an extensive look at the Battle of Midway, excellent read.

I have read dozens of books on WWII and my three favorites are:

1)"The Forgotten Soldier" by Guy Sajer- The story of a German soldier in Russia. Some people have called into question some of his facts but I have been assured by several respected historians that under the stress of constant combat its hard to remember exactly everything. I think it is the best book ever written about the common soldier in WWII. You can't put it down once you start reading.

2)"If You Survive" by George Wilson. This is another riveting book by a combat soldier about his adventures from Normandy to the Battle of The Bulge. Great read.

3)"Clear The Bridge!" by Richard O'Kane. O'Kane won the Medal Of Honor for his service on the sub USS Tang. Great story of what it was like on a combat sub in WWII.

Cornelius Ryan wrote his books (the Longest Day; A Bridge Too Far) about World War II based upon interviews he conducted in the late 1940's with eye witnesses to important WW II battles and events. Ryan's books are the standard to which all others are compared.

I am a big fan of Rick Atkinson’s books, including An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa, 1942-43 and The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-44. I can not wait until the third book in his Liberation Trilogy comes out. (Atkinson also wrote, "The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point’s Class of 1966", which is also excellent.

Anthony Beevor's books are also terrific. He is British, and his books emphasize British contributions to the war more than most American authors do.

I understand that many posters here like Stephen Ambrose. Ambrose is okay [his earlier work is good; but his later work included a lot of recycled ideas (not to mention the plagiarism accusations)]. The D-Day Museum in New Orleans, which he helped found, includes thousands of oral histories and is pretty cool (as if you need an excuse to go to New Orleans). Just the same, I suspect most real historians consider Ambrose to be something of a lightweight (apologies to all who are offended).

"Give Us This Day" by Sidney Stewart I believe. It is about his recollection of the Bataan death march. I read it in middle school and it had a significant impact on me at a young age.

I've read a TON of WWII books.

3 favorites that come to mind are

THREE CAME HOME by Agnes Newton Keith


Castles burning: a child's life in war By Magda Denes


Parachute Infantry: An American Paratrooper's Memoir of D-Day and the Fall of the Third Reich (Dell War Series) by David Kenyon Webster

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Last Stand of the Tin Can Soldiers

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Reading this one now.