What are we reading?

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

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Sir Slash

Fantastic series on WWI East Front. Loved them all.  O0
"Take a look at that". Sgt. Wilkerson-- CMBN. His last words after spotting a German tank on the other side of a hedgerow.

ArizonaTank

#5446
On the somewhat light side, I am reading:

Pacific Adversaries. Volume 2: Imperial Japanese Navy vs. The Allies, New Guinea & the Solomons 1942-1944
by Michael Claringbould

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0648665909?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2_dt_b_product_details

The book has 15 chapters. All are about the length of a magazine article. What is great about each chapter is that they tell the story of a specific small action between Japanese Navy and Allied air forces in New Guinea and the Solomons, '42 to '44. Each story is checked against Allied and Japanese records for accuracy. Each chapter has a detailed description of the action along with a description of what happened to the aircraft and pilots. In many cases, the author visited the wrecks of downed aircraft for the story and has pictures of them. For modelers, each chapter also has some very nice plates showing the specific color scheme and markings (as flown by each crew on the day of the mission) for the main aircraft mentioned in the story. Overall, it is about the size of an Osprey book, with great photographs and illustrations. Pacific Adversaries would be a great coffee table book that can be picked up and read easily in 10-20 min increments. The book is soft cover and on the pricy side...but if WWII Pacific air combat is your thing...a great book to have in your library.

This is volume 2 in a series, and I am already saving my pennies to get some more of them.
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

About to start A Man at Arms by Steven Pressfield.


слава Україна!

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

-JudgeDredd

MengJiao

#5448
Quote from: Gusington on June 05, 2021, 03:02:05 PM
About to start A Man at Arms by Steven Pressfield.

Starting Richard B. Frank Tower of Skulls A History of the Asia-Pacific War, July 1937 to May 1942.  Now with real Chinese!

By the way, what is up with Ian W. Toll?  In the Conquering Tide, he borrows from Frank's Guadalcanal and doesn't even have him in the bibliography (much less cited).
Moreover, in the preface to Twilight of the Gods (and maybe elsewhere) he says he's only thinking about competing with books in the current period...since 1990
(Frank's Guadalcanal came out in 1990).
Very weird.

Anyway, here's Frank:

https://www.c-span.org/video/?469611-1/tower-skulls


Gusington

I read A Tower of Skulls last summer and loved it.


слава Україна!

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

-JudgeDredd

nobodyjune61944

Quote from: MengJiao on June 05, 2021, 07:40:23 PM
Quote from: Gusington on June 05, 2021, 03:02:05 PM
About to start A Man at Arms by Steven Pressfield.

Starting Richard B. Frank Tower of Skulls A History of the Asia-Pacific War, July 1937 to May 1942.  Now with real Chinese!

By the way, what is up with Ian W. Toll?  In the Conquering Tide, he borrows from Frank's Guadalcanal and doesn't even have him in the bibliography (much less cited).
Moreover, in the preface to Twilight of the Gods (and maybe elsewhere) he says he's only thinking about competing with books in the current period...since 1990
(Frank's Guadalcanal came out in 1990).
Very weird.

Anyway, here's Frank:

https://www.c-span.org/video/?469611-1/tower-skulls
Tower of Skulls is an excellent, though depressing book.  Until I read it I was unaware of how many military and civilian deaths the Chinese suffered against the Japanese. 

Toonces

Whoa...a Pressfield book I haven't heard of?  Off to check that bad boy out.

Gus, if you like Pressfield (he's one of my favorite authors) you might want to check out The Lion's Gate.  Kinda tagging on the R&P discussions, Lion's Gate is about the Arab-Israeli wars.  I have it on my Kindle, but haven't read it yet.  I am reading his one about the Long Range Desert Group: Killing Rommel right now and, as usual, it's bloody awesome.
"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

Gusington

^Pressfield is the ******* man. I've read most of his ancients titles and loved them. A Man at Arms just came out this year after he took a 10+ year hiatus from fiction writing. I'm 60 pages in and he has not lost his touch. It's a little more melodramatic than the other ancient titles, but that doesn't take away from Pressfield's writing skill.

I've had The Lion's Gate on my to-get list for a while. I always forget about Killing Rommel but will add that to the list on your recommendation. I have this in my cart right now, which may interest you too:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1472842154/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_1?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1


слава Україна!

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

-JudgeDredd

fran

With the old breed E.B Sledge

Peleliu and Okinawa

nobodyjune61944

Quote from: fran on June 06, 2021, 02:47:23 PM
With the old breed E.B Sledge

Peleliu and Okinawa

My wife set up the digitized collection of EB Sledge's donations to the AU Library.

If you are interested you can see it at: http://diglib.auburn.edu/collections/ebsledge/

MengJiao

Quote from: nobodyjune61944 on June 06, 2021, 04:18:34 PM
Quote from: fran on June 06, 2021, 02:47:23 PM
With the old breed E.B Sledge

Peleliu and Okinawa

My wife set up the digitized collection of EB Sledge's donations to the AU Library.

If you are interested you can see it at: http://diglib.auburn.edu/collections/ebsledge/

Awesome!!!

fran

Quote from: nobodyjune61944 on June 06, 2021, 04:18:34 PM
Quote from: fran on June 06, 2021, 02:47:23 PM
With the old breed E.B Sledge

Peleliu and Okinawa

My wife set up the digitized collection of EB Sledge's donations to the AU Library.

If you are interested you can see it at: http://diglib.auburn.edu/collections/ebsledge/

Thank you for posting, very interesting finding out more about him.

Gusington

Now reading Gaiseric: The Vandal Who Destroyed Rome by Ian Hughes.


слава Україна!

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

-JudgeDredd

JasonPratt

Finished up Churchill's The Grand Alliance last week but forgot to mention it; now a few chapters into Vol.4, The Hinge of Fate.

TGA ended with an amusing recount of Churchill's first experience traveling by flying boat, making an opportunistic jump (thanks to a great tailwind) from Bermuda to England, rather than steaming there on the surface in a fast battleship with destroyers. He loved the craft itself, and the pilot was excited at the challenge of making the jump -- but packing so many high rankers into the flight was a dicey chance, as was demonstrated when the final 10 hours was made above a thick overcast (undercast ;) ) and mist obscuring stellar navigation.

Eventually, the liasons (...dang I can never spell that...) whom Churchill had brought to Washington (for his first conference with FDR after Japan's attack), for air and naval strategy, decided with the pilot that it was time to turn north RIGHT NOW; and so not long afterward they reached Plymouth. When the plane landed, its captain confided that he had never been so relieved as to deliver Churchill and his group safely.

Not long afterward, Churchill heard why: had they spent another five or six minutes on their current bearing, they would have been over the Brest anti-aircraft defenses! And perhaps worse, they didn't have fuel remaining for much maneuvering beyond their turn north; so as far as UK radar was concerned this was a lone bomber, flying in from the Brest fields, trying to use cloud cover for a morning raid navigating by radio crossbeam. So six Hurricanes had been diverted from patrol by Fighter Command to shoot the flying boat down!

"However," Churchill dryly finishes the main text of the book, "they failed in their mission."
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RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

Gusington

How many pages total is Grand Alliance?


слава Україна!

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

-JudgeDredd