What are we reading?

[RedArgo]

Just finished reading Incredible Victory and Good Shepard, both very good.  I'll be interested to see how Good Shepard translates to the big screen since a lot of the main characters dialog is in his head/narrator.

I've read the whole Hornblower series 2 or 3 times and the first 4 Aubrey books, I like both, but Hornblower is my favorite, feels a little easier to read for me.

Shattered Sword is also very good.  The Battle of Midway was my favorite WWII battle as a kid, so I always like getting more information about it.

[al_infierno]

What's the best approach to the Hornblower series?  First book going forward?  Or is it like the Bond series where you don't really need to read them in order?

[RedArgo]

I'd say it is better to read them in order as some characters come and go through the series and his career builds, but they aren't so complicated you'd be lost if you didn't read them in order.  When I first started reading them it was just what ever my dad had in the house, so I know I missed entire books and it didn't diminish my enjoyment.

I read them most recently on my Kindle and at least at that time the books weren't available on Amazon, so got them here enetpress.com.

[ArizonaTank]

I'd say it is better to read them in order as some characters come and go through the series and his career builds, but they aren't so complicated you'd be lost if you didn't read them in order.  When I first started reading them it was just what ever my dad had in the house, so I know I missed entire books and it didn't diminish my enjoyment.

I read them most recently on my Kindle and at least at that time the books weren't available on Amazon, so got them here enetpress.com.

+1 on reading in order. But also agree that you can jump in and out of the series and still enjoy them.

I have read the entire series about 5 times over the last 30 years, and it still holds my attention.

If you want to read one, just to see if you would like them, I suggest "Ship of the Line"

I did not know about enetpress  very nice to see that...

[Martok]

For a decidedly lighter read, I've finally gotten around to cracking open my copy of The Autobiography of James T. Kirk: The Story of Starfleet's Greatest Captain, as "edited" by David A. Goodman.  While I didn't anticipate the book being bad, I'm still I'm enjoying it far more than I thought I would. 

What's the best approach to the Hornblower series?  First book going forward?  Or is it like the Bond series where you don't really need to read them in order?

If you read the books "in order", I recommend doing so in chronological order, as opposed to the order in which the books were written/released.  So start with Mr. Midshipman Hornblower, rather than Beat to Quarters. 

Good series, by the way.  I really need to purchase it for myself (I borrowed them from the library the first time).  O0 

[airboy]

I read the Hornblower books so many times through the end of High School I knew them back to front.  My Dad had all of Forrester's work in hardback.  Unfortunately, by the time my parents died I could no longer read them because of paper deterioration & allergies.

Not as good, but the same sorts of things in SF are the Honor Harrington books by Weber and the Leary books by David Drake. 

I prefer Drakes because Harrington is too perfect in all of her skills and her enemies are always utterly awful folks.  I mentioned this to David Weber over a game of Hearts at Liberty Con and he said he hears this about the character all of the time - and that the opinion was wrong, wrong, wrong because she does things that violate the normal rules of war for a 20th/21st century Western naval commander.  I thought his defense was off - but I did not go into it further.  Told him he should really like me since I had more than a dozen of his sole or co-authored books in hardback.

[RedArgo]

I really enjoyed the Harrington main series, I'm glad he finally finished it.  I haven't read any of the side Harrington stories though.

[nelmsm]

I'm working my way through D'Este's Decision In Normandy. Pretty interesting so far.

[al_infierno]

I've got Mr. Midshipman Hornblower on the way from Amazon as we speak.   O0  No doubt it'll be a while 'til I've got book in hand, considering the delays at the 'zon.

I finished The Old Man and the Sea a few days back, and instead of writing a review I figured this Ancestor quote from Darkest Dungeon summarizes it perfectly:

[Gusington]

About to begin Hadrian's Wall by Adrian Goldsworthy.

[airboy]

Just finished "The Collapse of the Third Republic; An Inquiry into the Fall of France" by William Shirer

Shirer was a journalist, but despite this, I found his description of the military campaign to be very good and compelling.

France was betrayed at several levels:

The most senior French generals were just outmaneuvered by the Germans. They never saw Manstein's "sickle cut" through the Ardennes until it was too late. By that time they understood what was happening, they had lost the cream of the French army, and most of the BEF was destroyed or had fled through Dunkirk. 

The military campaign was basically lost in the first two weeks, but it lingered for another four weeks. During that time, Weygand the Commander in Chief of Armed Forces began to agitate for an Armistice. He actively suppressed efforts move forces to North Africa to continue the fight.

The French Prime Minister, Reynaud wanted to fight on. He had support from the military in North Africa and the Governments of the UK and US. But he was betrayed by political schemers led by Laval, a former PM with a political axe to grind.

Laval was an opportunist, hoping for power in a French run province for Hitler, licking up German table scraps. The premise was that Britain would fall as well, so they might as well get on Hitler's good side before Britain could. Laval pulled the strings that set up an authoritarian coup led by Petain. But Laval was the puppet master, pulling Petain's strings.

After the war, Laval was executed, and Petain was given a commuted death sentence. I used to think these sentences were harsh. But now that I understand how they both betrayed their country in its time of most need, I feed the sentences were justified. 

Anyway great book.  But 1/2 political, and 1/2 military.   

I got bogged down in his explanations for the collapse of the 3rd Republic starting right after the collapse of Napoleon III. 

He kept veering into weird tangents.  Dreyfus - a Jewish scapegoat for someone else leaking French military secrets.  Lots of people lied about it.  This was horrible.  OK - I agree with the author.  He suffered horribly.  The French kept blowing their military security to the Germans.  OK - good points.

Some Catholic orders did not support the 3rd Republic.  They were banned by the State, the State was angry they could not name Catholic Bishops, they exiled huge numbers of priests and forbade even more to have anything to do with French education.  This is "good" by the author except that many could not get over the actions of the 3rd Republic and held a grudge.

Napoleon & Napoleon III - horrible dictators.  Anyone who was supporting them or a return of the monarchy is horrible, horrible.

The Dictators - well, they fought hard for France and anyone who did not support this is horrible.

He kept this weird dance up for at least 100 pages.  Anything supporting the 3rd Republic - Excellent (ban their papers, exile them, interfere with religion - all in the name of "progress."  Dreyfus - lying and punishing an innocent man is bad, bad, bad - unless they are enemies of the 3rd Republic when it is a good thing.

And he kept repeating himself.  This book is 1,082 pages - so be forewarned. 

I'm not contradicting anything Arizona Tank wrote about - because I could not get past the horrible moral "ends justify the means - except they kept France from uniting" without proper editing.

If you decide to get this one, skip to at least the end of WW1.  I might try to read this again some year, but I also got bogged down in Rise & Fall of the Third Reich which could have had one page out of every two cut without losing much.

[Myrmidon]

Oh man, a book thread!!! (Then realized there's an entire book forum page).

Currently working through Mary Beard's SPQR.  So far, has been a great mind opener about the birth of the Republic, and challenges what I thought I knew about the subject.  Only about a quarter through so far, but I anticipate me having some new perspectives on the topic by the time I finish.

My current audio book is Wars of the Roses by Dan Jones, which really brings to life the conflict and what led up to it.  For any interested in the topics, the same author's more recent published books The Templars and Crusaders do a great job of approaching the topics academically but in a very accessible and easy to read(or listen) manner.

[Gusington]

Now reading Roman Warfare by Adrian Goldsworthy.

[Martok]

Just started Warrior of the Altaii by Robert Jordan.  It was the first book he wrote, but not published until last year. 

[Gusington]

Now reading Caligula - The Mad Emperor of Rome by Stephen Dando Collins.