What are we reading?

Started by Martok, March 05, 2012, 01:13:59 PM

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JasonPratt

#5625
I can tell you from now-long-personal experience: if you don't like The Gathering Storm by the time the shooting starts, you might as well give up and maybe find an abridged set of his WW2 memoirs, because all five volumes (and his WW1 memoir volumes) are going to be like that. Churchill can be a great writer, but he's rarely going for artistic effect in those two sets (which are 9 or 10 volumes, each of them 2 books each). Mostly he's trying to provide an archive of correspondence between himself and other principals, and his side of those correspondences aren't meant to be very artistic either. You'll get some dry turns of phrase occasionally, and some clever anecdotes on rare occasion, but that's it.

I'm chugging slowly through Vol 4, Closing the Ring, mostly about Italy and surrounding areas in 1943, early 44, and I'm having to salt it with chapters from several other books in between. In my defense, I started all the way back at Vol 1 of his History of English-Speaking Peoples, and have gone through that set and The World Crisis volumes on WW1, so I'm about worn out. ;) But for what it's worth, his first set is more artistically written, closer to what you'd expect for listening to Churchill. (I suspect his mere memoirs, so to speak, are much less dry, too, such as regarding his early military career.)
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

Giappy

#5626
Quote from: JasonPratt on March 31, 2022, 01:16:53 PM
I can tell you from now-long-personal experience: if you don't like The Gathering Storm by the time the shooting starts, you might as well give up and maybe find an abridged set of his WW2 memoirs, because all five volumes (and his WW1 memoir volumes) are going to be like that...

I'm chugging slowly through Vol 4, Closing the Ring, mostly about Italy and surrounding areas in 1943, early 44, and I'm having to salt it with chapters from several other books in between. In my defense, I started all the way back at Vol 1 of his History of English-Speaking Peoples, and have gone through that set and The World Crisis volumes on WW1, so I'm about worn out. ;) But for what it's worth, his first set is more artistically written, closer to what you'd expect for listening to Churchill. (I suspect his mere memoirs, so to speak, are much less dry, too, such as regarding his early military career.)

Toonces--I was going to say the same thing as JasonPratt (i.e. just give up or get an abridged set if it's not enjoyable).  I'm on chapter 26 of 38 and have really enjoyed it, but then again it's been spread out over many months.

JasonPratt-I bet you are about worn out!  That is *a lot* of WSC!

JasonPratt

I will say I liked the first two WW2 volumes better than the two films made (very very loosely) from them. They are both very much warts-and-all biopics, which certainly doesn't have to be a bad thing; but they emphasized the warts so much, I don't recall anything particularly admirable about Churchill from those films. (He gives a few famous speeches but those might as well be from different films.)
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

Toonces

I actually started liking The Gathering Storm a whole lot better once the shooting started.  The Norway campaign was really interesting.  I finally finished it up and moved on to Volume 2: Their Finest Hour. 

I'm finding that if I just skip/skim the political stuff it's a much better read.  The first half of The Gathering Storm was a real slog IMO.  Important, but still not very interesting to me.
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

fran

Finished Brothers in arms: By tank to Germany by James Holland

Currently reading The battle of Midway by Craig L. Symonds. Really enjoying it so far. Up to Chapter 8, the Battle of Coral Sea

Gusington

Now reading The Early Chinese Empires: Qin and Han by Mark Edward Lewis.


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

Gusington

Just started The Trojan War: A New History by Barry Strauss:

https://amzn.to/3yRhKG3

I know nothing about the Trojan War so hoping to learn a few things.


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

ArizonaTank

Just finishing "The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire 1936-1945" by John Toland.

The book covers the Pacific War mostly from the Japanese point of view. This is an older book (written in 1970) and therefore does not have benefit from recent scholarship. Still, I have not seen any other single volume that covers the Japanese side so well. It is particularly good at addressing the several pre-war military coup attempts that while not successful, still managed to drive Japan into the militarist's corner. The book also does a great job in describing the various military rebellions after Nagasaki, that attempted to stop Japan's ultimate surrender. This book won a well deserved Pulitzer Prize in its time.

https://www.amazon.com/Rising-Sun-Decline-Japanese-1936-1945/dp/0812968581/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1653140163&sr=8-2
Johannes "Honus" Wagner
"The Flying Dutchman"
Shortstop: Pittsburgh Pirates 1900-1917
Rated as the 2nd most valuable player of all time by Bill James.

bobarossa

#5633
Quote from: ArizonaTank on May 21, 2022, 08:47:26 AM
Just finishing "The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire 1936-1945" by John Toland.

The book covers the Pacific War mostly from the Japanese point of view. This is an older book (written in 1970) and therefore does not have benefit from recent scholarship. Still, I have not seen any other single volume that covers the Japanese side so well. It is particularly good at addressing the several pre-war military coup attempts that while not successful, still managed to drive Japan into the militarist's corner. The book also does a great job in describing the various military rebellions after Nagasaki, that attempted to stop Japan's ultimate surrender. This book won a well deserved Pulitzer Prize in its time.

https://www.amazon.com/Rising-Sun-Decline-Japanese-1936-1945/dp/0812968581/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1653140163&sr=8-2
Been a longggg time since I read it but try The Pacific War 1931-1945 by Saburo Ienaga.  I think this is where I learned about the military control of Japanese education in the early part of the century leading to the mindset that led to war.  Written in 1978 so same age problem as Toland. 

Dammit Carl!

Quote from: ArizonaTank on May 21, 2022, 08:47:26 AM
Just finishing "The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire 1936-1945" by John Toland.

The book covers the Pacific War mostly from the Japanese point of view. This is an older book (written in 1970) and therefore does not have benefit from recent scholarship. Still, I have not seen any other single volume that covers the Japanese side so well. It is particularly good at addressing the several pre-war military coup attempts that while not successful, still managed to drive Japan into the militarist's corner. The book also does a great job in describing the various military rebellions after Nagasaki, that attempted to stop Japan's ultimate surrender. This book won a well deserved Pulitzer Prize in its time.

https://www.amazon.com/Rising-Sun-Decline-Japanese-1936-1945/dp/0812968581/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1653140163&sr=8-2

Won't lie; this is on my "re-read," list more often than not.

ArizonaTank

Quote from: bobarossa on May 21, 2022, 09:15:59 AM
Quote from: ArizonaTank on May 21, 2022, 08:47:26 AM
Just finishing "The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire 1936-1945" by John Toland.

The book covers the Pacific War mostly from the Japanese point of view. This is an older book (written in 1970) and therefore does not have benefit from recent scholarship. Still, I have not seen any other single volume that covers the Japanese side so well. It is particularly good at addressing the several pre-war military coup attempts that while not successful, still managed to drive Japan into the militarist's corner. The book also does a great job in describing the various military rebellions after Nagasaki, that attempted to stop Japan's ultimate surrender. This book won a well deserved Pulitzer Prize in its time.

https://www.amazon.com/Rising-Sun-Decline-Japanese-1936-1945/dp/0812968581/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1653140163&sr=8-2

Been a longggg time since I read it but try The Pacific War 1931-1945 by Saburo Ienaga.  I think this is where I learned about the military control of Japanese education in the early part of the century leading to the mindset that led to war.  Written in 1978 so same age problem as Toland.

Thanks, I will check it out.
Johannes "Honus" Wagner
"The Flying Dutchman"
Shortstop: Pittsburgh Pirates 1900-1917
Rated as the 2nd most valuable player of all time by Bill James.

Gusington

Now reading 1177BC: The Year Civilization Collapsed by Eric H. Cline.


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

JasonPratt

Ooo, the Bronze Age collapse? Sea Peoples? Giants from Atlantis?! :D
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

Gusington

^Yes, all of the above. I'm taking notes.


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd

Gusington

Now reading Sparta at War: Strategy, Tactics, Campaigns 550BC-362BC by Scott Rusch.


слава Україна!

We can't live under the threat of a c*nt because he's threatening nuclear Armageddon.

-JudgeDredd