Truly one of the best WWII books I have read.
Inferno: The World at War, 1939-1945 by Max Hastings.

http://www.amazon.com/Inferno-The-World-War-1939-1945/dp/0307273598/ref=pd_sim_b_30

Last edited Thu Aug 2, 2012, 05:24 PM - Edit history (1)

We Band of Angels and If I Perish~Both about nurses in WWII. We Band of Angels is about nurses trapped on Bataan and If I Perish is about the nurses who were on the front lines in Africa and the European theater. Seems that a lot of people overlook the contributions of these women during WWII...very sad.

link:http://www.amazon.com/We-Band-Angels-American-Japanese/dp/0671787187/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1343945893&sr=1-1&keywords=we+band+of+angels+the+untold+story+of+american+nurses+trapped+on+bataan|

http://www.amazon.com/If-Perish-Frontline-Nurses-World/dp/140003129X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1343946059&sr=1-1&keywords=and+if+I+perish

I'm mainly drawn to aviation and the history the Pacific theater. Though one of the more striking books I've read in recent years is away from my normal WWII interests, "Death Traps" by Belton Cooper. It's a fascinating memoir revealing how hard it was to keep a US armored division going when its main tank, the M4 Sherman, was outclassed by German armor. The details of recovering, cleaning, repairing and returning to battle damaged tanks reveal a lot about the war tank crews were forced to fight. Even where the author is wrong in his analysis of the big picture, I appreciate why he draws the conclusions he does. (In a nutshell, Cooper blames Patton for the widespread use of the Sherman and would have preferred a heavier vehicle as the chief US tank; at the same time, he acknowledges that the style of warfare Patton used to great effect calls for a medium tank with basically the characteristics of the Sherman. I think Cooper had a hard time reconciling the success of Patton's tank doctrine (under which the tank vs. tank battles were to be avoided) with the human costs he saw every day as he worked on the remains of Shermans - and their crews - unfortunate enough to meet Panzers.)

When we entered the war, the US pretty much picked a specific design and stuck with it. So we picked the Sherman, which was a mechanically reliable tank with good mobility. There were also logistical issues, in that there were very few ships that could handle transporting anything larger then a Sherman tank from the US to Europe in quantities large enough to make a difference.

I'm reading it very slowly but it's fascinating and chilling.

And with how many versions there are, mine is probably out of date.

wow.

from my reading so far, I can tell that my tour guide in Munich read it too.

You ever finish it?

I'd read In The Garden of Beasts and realized I needed more information - I didn't know enough to follow everything as well as I wanted to. I remembered I'd picked this up for the Kindle when it was on sale at some point and started in on it. A LONG book but very interesting.

This book is about the Bataan Death March. Great read...goes a little too in depth about the Japanese troops' point of view, in my opinion, but it alternates between American GI's and the Japanese. It paints a very vivid portrait of the hell that our poor soldiers when through.

Also just started a book called "Ghost Soldiers" by Hampton Sides. This one is about the Raid on Cabanatuan and was made into a movie a few years back. I've only read the first couple of chapters, but was shocked and horrified by the story, right from the beginning.

I wouldn't mind following the plot lines of a Vulcan crew in Star Trek. Star Fleet is too repetitious.

(Forgive the analogy, I'm watching the show at the moment.)

I guess I'm just not used to reading the Japanese views...most other books seem to focus mostly on US GI's views.

I have a feeling that it's more of a language barrier than anything else.

I've been focusing on the some of the German and Russian soldiers individual stories on the Eastern Front.
Both sides say it was just a brutal, savage fight. Prisoners were rarely taken and massacres & brutality toward the enemy was common by both sides.
Closest comparison I can think of would be 4 years of Iwo Jima non-stop.

Fast read about one of the Japanese internment camps. It reads like a novel.

Neptune's Inferno (Naval battles off Guadalcanal) and Last Stand of the Tin Can Soldiers (the sacrifice of the destroyers and destroyer escorts off Leyte Gulf) both by James Hornfischer

Defeat Into Victory by Field Marshal William Slim. About the China-Burma-India theater by one of the best generals of WWII

Quartered Safe Out Here by George MacDonald Fraser for the common infantryman's view of the same battles as in Defeat Into Victory

Soldat by Siegfried Knappe A german soldier;s story from 1936 when he joined the army to the fall of Berlin and his 5 years in a Soviet prison camp

It's a true story written by the author of "Seabiscuit" Laura Hillenbrand.