War books

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 Flinticus 22 Feb 2019

I am reading The Things They Carried and its a great piece of semi-autobiography and deals with all the horror, banality and fog of war. I've also read Dispatches. 

Any books of a similar quality on WW1/11 on indeed any conflict?

 Welsh Kate 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Storm of Steel by the German officer Ernst Junger. He incredibly survived active service through some of the most intense battles of WW1 despite being shot several times. It's one of the earliest memoirs from the period from either side.

 1poundSOCKS 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

I can only remember reading one so maybe I'm not the best judge,  but I thought it was excellent.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Last-Valley-Vietnam-Military-Paperbacks/dp/0304366...

 elsewhere 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

From the city from the plough

Alexander baron

Novel is lightly fictionalised version of 5th Wiltshires in Normandy from viewpoint of the private soldiers

 profitofdoom 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Two I found very good are 1. Stalingrad by Antony Beevor. 2. Seven Pillars of Wisdom by T.E. Lawrence

Gone for good 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

They called it Passchendale by Lynn McDonald. About the 3rd battle of Ypres and the men who fought it.

Any of the Anthony Beevor books about the large scale battles of WW2. Stalingrad. D Day and Normandy. Berlin. The Ardennes. 

In reply to Flinticus:

This a post by detwent diluted from November last year. I’m on my phone so couldn’t post link to thread but found it and copied his excellent post here below. If you want to find thread it was authored by Rampikino in Nov last year and was titled Great War book recommendations please. 

“An excellent book on tunneling is 'War Underground' by Alexander Barry, I expected a dry account with a lot of technical detail on pumps or wooden shoring, I got a read as exciting as any thriller. A real page turner, if Birdsong ignited any interest in this part of WW1 then time spent tracking this down won't be wasted.

I read of WW1 books, here are some picks from my shelves, some well known others a little more obscure. They do however represent my interest in the Land War on the Western Front. I have left out some obvious choices such as "All Quiet.." and "Goodbye to all that"as they are pretty well known.

*** essential

** very good

First person memoirs/diaries,

Somme Mud, EPF Lynch. ***  Modest Australian memoir from the thick of it. 

A Very Unimportant Officer,  Capt. A Stewart, Edited by Cameron Stewart.

Storm of Steel, E. Junger.  Well known title, War can be fun! ***

Copse 125, E Junger. More exposition of Jungers 'philosophy' and some insights into a man who defies lazy categorisation. **

Harrys' War, H Drinkwater.

A Gunner on the Western Front, Aubery Wade **  An artillerymans memoirs, captures an essence of inescapable horror.

Field Guns in France, N Fraser-Tytler*** War as fun from the British perspective, takes delight in shelling Germans and shooting partridge equally.

Some Desperate Glory, Edwin Campion Vaughan. **

Undertones of War, Edmund Blunden ***

A Nurse at the Front, Edith Appleton, Edited by Ruth Cowan *** Essential diary of nursing

With a Machine Gun to Cambrai, G Coppard.

Drawing Fire, Len Smith, An artist at war sent out into No mans land to sketch the German lines, just like in Blackadder but for real.

Sniping in France, Major H Hesketh Pritchard ** Very readable technical account of the development of sniping and use of big game hunting techniques, illuminates a 'free lance' side of the war.

The War the Infantry Knew, Capt JC Dunn *** If you picked one book from this list....

Historical/technical but very readable;

The Hell They Called High Wood, Terry Norman. Possibly the most contested few acres of the Somme battle? 8000 men still lie there unburied.

Somme, Heroism & Horror, Martin Gilbert

Raiding on the Western Front, Anthony Saunders, 

The Blood Tub, Jonathan Walker. Account of the desperate fighting around Bullecourt

Fromelles, Patrick Lindsay, 

The Marne, Georges Blond

Verdun, Georges Blond 

The White War, Mark Thompson, The war on the Italian front

Zeebrugge, Barrie Pitt

The Price of Glory, Alistair Horne. Account of Verdun,  A masterpiece still acknowledged as authoritarive after 50 years

Fiction,

Under Fire, Henri Barbusse, slow to start but inexorably leads you into hell.

Covenant with Death, John Harris. All but true account of the Sheffield Pals. 'Two years in the making, a moment in the destroying'

Reference/etc - just a small few

The Somme/Passchendaele/Arras/Battlefiields of the First World War, Peter Barton  lavish comparisons of Battlefield panoramic photos

Beneath Flanders Fields, Peter Barton, Excavations and history of the underground war.

Before Endeavours Fade, Rose Coombs, Battlefield touring itineries. Often updated and ideal for exploring. Not too Ypres/Somme centric which I like.

Digging up Plugstreet, Martin Brown & Richard Osgood. Archaeology of a WW1 battlefield.

The War Walk, Nigel H Jones, Account of the Western Front on foot.

Anything by Richard Holmes, Lyn MacDonald and Richard Van Emden are usually worth reading.

Also worth hunting down, if you are into the recovery of the land  are the titles from the 1930's ; "Twenty Years After", also "The Great War - I was there" and "The Western Front then and now" (not to be confused with the later book of the same title by John Giles, which is also very good).  If you are going back to the 1930's look out for the photo- books printed by the Daily Express as warning about another world war, these are "The First World War - a photographic history" -prophetic title as it was published in 1933, and the quite rare "Covenants with Death" with its notorious sealed section of graphic images of the dead and atrocities. These are mostly from the Balkans and highlight the long standing animosities here. 

There are loads, loads more, but all the above should be accessible to those with a casual or passing interest. Some accounts get a bit bogged down with a lot of detail.

Conversely I'm always after recommendations myself, I especially like reading the long forgotten diaries and memoirs of those who were actually there.”

Post edited at 20:34
In reply to Flinticus:

I’m currently reading Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning. It’s about a German reserve police battalion in Poland that killed thousands of Jews in 1942. It’s a study of how ordinary men react under orders when asked to commit atrocities. Not far into it so can’t really comment on how good it is. I have been reading anything I can lay my hands on about the holocaust over the last year. If your interested in specifically the final solution then I can point you towards some good reads. 

 Phil1919 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Montserrat.

Gone for good 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Bjartur i Sumarhus:

I've read that book. Very sobering and disturbing.

 DerwentDiluted 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

I won't go over WW1 books again, but good reads from Vietnam are Chickenhawk by Robert Mason and A rumour of war by Phillip Caputo.

I'd also recommend Black Edelweiss by Johann Voss, a memoir of the Waffen SS fighting in Kurland. 

Post edited at 21:35
 Trangia 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Storm of Steel by Ernst Junger

All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque

Her Privates We or the unsanitised Middle Part of Fortune by Private 19022

The War The Infantry Knew by Capt. JC Dunn

Undertones of Way by Edmund Blunden

Good-bye to All That by Robert Graves

Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man by Siegfried Sassoon

Memoirs of an Infantry Officer by Siegfried Sassoon

Sagittarius Rising by Cecil Lewis

The First Day on the Somme by Martin Middlebrook

General Jack's Diary edited by John Terraine

Somme by Lyn Macdonald

They Called it Passchendaele by Lyn Mcdonald

To The Last Man by Lyn Macdonald

The Roses of No Man's Land by Lyn Mcdonald

Gallipoli by Alan Moorehead

Tommy Goes to War by Malcolm Brown

Vimy by Pierre Berton

 DerwentDiluted 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Trangia:

> Her Privates We or the unsanitised Middle Part of Fortune by Private 19022

Thats a new one to me which I will track down.

> Vimy by Pierre Berton

That's a great book, goes into the small unit tactics developed by the Canadians and used successfully at Vimy Ridge.

Pan Ron 22 Feb 2019
In reply to DerwentDiluted:

I second Chickenhawk and Rumour of War for Vietnam.  Though I think its accepted that Chickenhawk is lots of stories rolled in to one rather than Robert Mason's actual experience.

Matterhorn however, really broke new ground on the Vietnam war for me.  Its the closest a book has got to capturing my own peacetime infantry experience (mind-numbing fatigue, exhaustion, stress), while being set in the Vietnam war and written by a widely recognised and respected Vietnam vet.

For non-fiction, War Without Fronts (Vietnam) and Stalingrad (WWII) were immense.  The first became too much - I got too angry.  The second was mindboggling for the horror.

 jockster 22 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Quartered Safe out Here, George MacDonald Fraser

Quartered Safe Out Here https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0007105932/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_EuiCCbKB693H8

 Bobling 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

I've read a load over the years!

If I was to pick 3....

Matterhorn - pulled off a friend's bookshelf, because I thought it was about climbing, turns out not so.  Searing.  Karl Marlantes, the author, also turns up in the Vietnam War series recently put out by Ken Burns, which is well well worth your time.  But that's another thread.

Legionnaire - Simon Murray, an account of an British boy following his schoolboy dream of joining the Legion Etrangere.  

The Junior Officers' Reading Club - bang up to date, British troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Also a mate of mine gets name-checked as being one of the Club.  He too wrote his own book, Code Black, Mark Evans...a cautionary tale of boys who grow up wanting to go to war and then get their wish granted.  That's a very good read too - particularly if you want a better understanding of PTSD.

OK so that's four!  Lots of other good recommendations in this thread.

 jonnie3430 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

A Soldier's Diary, by Ralph Scott, about an RE officer in the last year of WWI. It claims at the start that the only way to prevent war is to be honest about the brutality of it. I recommend downloading the pdf here: https://archive.org/details/asoldiersdiary00scotuoft 

 Trangia 23 Feb 2019
In reply to DerwentDiluted:

The Middle Parts* of Fortune was first published anonymously but later revealed to have been written by Frederick Manning. A sanitised version Her Privates We was subsequently published again anonymously by Private 19022 (which was Manning's Army No). A great novel based on Manning's own war experiences which pulls no punches and was one of the first to expose what trench warfare was really like. Was widely acclaimed by people like TE Lawrence.

* Sorry I left the "s" of Parts in my first post

 Trangia 23 Feb 2019
In reply to jockster:

> Quartered Safe out Here, George MacDonald Fraser

I agree with that recommendation, thoughtful and at times humorous, personal recollection of a 19 year old infantryman's life (and death) fighting the fanatical Japanese in Burma in the last months of WW2 by the author of the Flashman series.

My previous recommendations were from WW1

Here's a few from WW2:-

The Berlin Raids by Martin Middlebrook

Tail End Charlies by John Nichol and Tony Rennell

First Light by Geoffrey Wellum

Nine Lives by Alan Deere

The Desert Generals by Correlli Barnett

Post WW2:-

The Argentine Fight for the Falklands by Martin Middlebrook

Vulcan 607 by Rowland White

Tornado Down by John Peters and John Nichol

Bravo Two Zero by Andy McNab

General Books:-

The Bowmen of England by Donald Featherstone

Redcoat by Richard Holmes

Tommy Atkins by John Laffin

 toddles 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Shots Fired in Anger 

By Lt. Col. John George

First hand account of the of a US Rifleman fighting on Guadalcanal and later with Merrill's Marauders.

He goes into great detail comparing the Japanese and American weapons and tactics.

 DerwentDiluted 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Goodbye Darkness by William Manchester, a memoir of the Island hopping campaign in the Pacific.

The War Lover, by John Hersey, a novel of the USAAF bombing of western Europe. Fiction, but generally considered as highly accurate.

Bomber, by Len Deighton, Fiction again, which is not my preference, but when it is this good who cares?!

While I'm on a fiction thing I'll give honourable mentions to Catch 22, for eloquently capturing the insanity of it all, and in a different vein, CS Forester books Brown on Resolution and The Ship. I'm not much into Naval stuff, but The Ship was great.

Post edited at 10:04
 THE.WALRUS 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Not WW1 or WW2, but another vote for The Things They Carrier and a Rumour of War.

If you're into audio books, the Audible version of Rumour (narrated by L J Ganser) is exceptional.

 alexm198 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

I'd recommend Enemy at the Gates by William Craig for an excellent and very readable account of the Battle of Stalingrad. I suspect some liberties were taken with details but it is largely well referenced.

The film of the same name borrowed its title from the book but isn't based on it. 

 Sayon 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

For a russian perspective on WW11, I can recommend Vasily Grossman's Life and Fate.

Gone for good 23 Feb 2019
In reply to DerwentDiluted:

Bomber is a superb book. As is Fighter which was a factual history of the Spitfire and the Battle of Britain, also written by Len Deighton.

Gone for good 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

The Naked and the  Dead by Norman Mailer is a superb account of US Marines fight against the Japanese in the Pacific. It's a novel but a very good one.

 Will Nicholls 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

The following stand out for me;

We Die Alone - an incredible account of a Norwegian commando's escape and evasion in the Lyngen Alps. 

All Quiet on the Western Front - WWI

Dispatches  - Vietnam

 OMR 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Bjartur i Sumarhus:

'Battalion' by Alastair Borthwick (yes, he of 'Always a Little Further') is a very good read: second world war, mainly in Italy if I recall correctly (which I maybe don't).

 DerwentDiluted 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Bjartur

 I have been reading anything I can lay my hands on about the holocaust over the last year. If your interested in specifically the final solution then I can point you towards some good reads. 

Have you read Forged in Fury by Michael Elkins or Babi Yar by Anatoly Kuznetsov? Both read a long time ago but remembered well.

In reply to Flinticus:

Another vote for The Last Valley - one of the best books I've read in any genre. You might need to steel yourself beforehand though - it's pretty harrowing. 

 Morty 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

About Face: The Odyssey of an American Warrior  by David Hackworth

 Skyfall 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

WW2 - maybe The Cruel Sea

vietnam - If I die in a combat zone (Tim O'Brien)  - autobiographical 

 tradisrad 23 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

I would highly recommend:

Jarhead: A Marine's Chronicle of the Gulf War and Other Battles - A rather frank and honest account of a somewhat disturbed USMC Scout Sniper. However, I expect many people will find less flattering aspects of themselves reflected in Swofford, I know I did.  Brilliantly written.

Catch 22 - The insanity of the military, read during my own basic training, much to the amusement of the DS.

Combat and Other Shenanigans - Funny stories from Iraq, a nice take on a part of military life that is often ignored. 

Post edited at 21:30
In reply to DerwentDiluted:

I have not, thank you for the recommendation..I will look them up.

 Ian Archer 24 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Spike Milligans war memoirs. Very funny and also very sad. 

 yeti 24 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Another vote for Storm of Steel

also The Forgotten Soldier by Guy Sajer (also worth looking up his paintings)

The Man Who Broke into Auschwitz by Denis Avey

if you're interested in the Burma railway I would recommend

The Forgotten Highlander by Alistair Urquhart 

and Burma Railway by Jack Chalker     great medical artwork alongside a brighter account of conditions

and also Weary Dunlops war diaries for his time in Burma as a surgeon

 Trangia 24 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Another unusual War/Mountaineering Book is No Picnic on Mt Kenya by Felice Benuzzi.

It is the true story of how Benuzzi, an experienced Italian mountaineer, was captured by the Allies in WW2 and imprisoned in a British POW camp in Kenya. From the camp he could see Mt Kenya and in 1943 he and two companions, having secretly constructed home made mountaineering equipment, escaped from the POW camp with the sole intention of climbing the nearly 17,000 ft Mt Kenya. Over the next few days evading wild animals rather than British soldiers they made their way to the mountain and climbed it. They then returned to the POW camp 17 days later and broke back in again. With help from their fellow POWs their escape had gone unnoticed by the British guards, and they returned to a life of boredom in the camp. He published the book after the war.

Post edited at 09:57
 Tom Valentine 24 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Fiction I know but - 

just finished "The Blasphemer" by Nigel Farndale which I found very moving in spite of the fact that the main character was singularly unlikable.

Late last year I read The Aftermath by Rhidian Brook which was very good and its topic of denazification quite apposite considering some recent debates on UKC. Out soon as a film with Keira Knightley.

Post edited at 10:13
 Stichtplate 24 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Some great stuff on here already. I'd add..

My War Gone By I Miss It So, by Anthony Loyd. Junky becomes war journalist, becomes junky war junky. Brilliant.

War, by Sebastian Junger. The book of the documentary, Restrepo.

Band Of Brothers, by Stephen E Ambrose. Everyone's seen the series, the book's just as good.

The semi-autobiographical Sword Of Honour trilogy is as well written and paced as you'd expect from Evelyn Waugh.

Few hundred years earlier: Constantinople, by Roger Crowley. It's about the final siege of 1453, an incredible story that reads more like a novel. 

Last segment of this weeks 'Open Book' was a nice round up of books written by Iraq veterans. Always a good listen in any case.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0002r6t

If you like the odd sword bashing historical series, I can't recommend Christian Cameron highly enough. Far superior to Bernard Cornwell (IMHO), he's written stacks but the Chivalry or Long War series are the two stand outs for me. Then there's the master of war on the waves, Patrick O'Brian.

Removed User 24 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

From the Vietnam era:

Fields of Fire - Jim Webb

Once a Warrior King - David Donovan

Chickenhawk - Robert Mason

 Albert Tatlock 24 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

A Soldiers Song by Ken Lukowiaks, Falklands paratrooper which won much critical acclaim.

OP Flinticus 26 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Wow. Loads of great recommendations here. Thanks all.

 EdS 26 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

The White War: Life and Death on the Italian Front, 1915-1919

Under the Devil's Eye: The British Military Experience in Macedonia 1915-18

Both self explanatory really

 wercat 27 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

2 books about tank warfare, one fictional but highly regarded.

"Warriors for the Working Day by Elstob (based on personal experience).

The second "Come to Dust" by Robin Maugham, nephew of W. Somerset, recalling experience in the Western Desert war.

On another note, the utterly fascinating "The Secret War" by Professor RV Jones who played a leading role in organising and analysing scientific intelligence to counter technological advances by Germany (The Battle of the Beams etc), though he did not recoil from blowing his own trumpet.  Someone I knew who studied under him told me he was often giving examples based on his experiences and if you went to sleep and missed them you'd be caught out in exams in which that information came up!

A Bridge too Far, The Longest Day on which films were based.

The Forever War books by Haldeman, an unorthodox and humorous sci fi account of life as a trooper in an interstellar war involving missions to targets so distant that return involves everything having changed while the troops are away, a comment on Haldeman's Vietnam experiences - very good.

Master and Commander  the series of books about naval warfare by Patrick O'Brian which should have you laughing out loud at times

Post edited at 09:21
 Fruit 27 Feb 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

’Into silence’ is a great crossover between war and mountaineering. Author Wade Davis

 DerwentDiluted 27 Feb 2019
In reply to wercat:

The Secret War is an amazing book! Proper James Bond stuff.

Other books shining light on hidden away aspects that are good reads are:

A Cold Blooded Business, memoir based history of Bomb disposal by Squadron Leader AE Haarer.

Eye of Intelligence, by Ursula Powys Lybbe. A surprisingly gripping memoir of aerial photo interpretation, no really! It's a great read.

Post edited at 09:40
 Pefa 03 Mar 2019
In reply to Flinticus:

Hidden History: The Secret Origins of the First World War by Gerry Doherty is a revelation to most people who believe the official narrative. 

1
 DaveHK 03 Mar 2019
In reply to jockster:

> Quartered Safe out Here, George MacDonald Fraser

Another vote for that.


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