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Fancy reading some wartime history. Any good books spring to mind?
Aviation is good. I don't know much about maritime. Not too interested in the far east.
John Ellis- One Day in a Very Long War. Interesting approach, talking about the events of 25 October 1944
Richard Hough- The Longest Battle: The War at Sea 1939-1945 is very readable
The recollections of Rifleman Bowlby.
Just finished, the Engineers of Victory by Paul Kennedy, very good
Chickenhawks by Robert Mason. Flying Hueys in Vietnam, funny, insightful and well written.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Battle-Narrow-Seas-1939-1945/dp/1848320353
brilliant "boys own" stuff sneaking around at nightin plywood speedboats
The Last Panther, Wolfgang Faust
Des Teufels General, Carl Zuckmayer.
Aviation, and not every German was a Nazi as the theme.
I rattled through A Higher Call in no time. Think I first heard of it on here. Absolutely recommended.
Ben Macintyre. Operation Mincemeat or Agent ZigZag should be good to start with.
Geoff Wellum's First Light is a must read.
Cornelius Ryan, The Longest Day
Rowland White, Vulcan 607. (His other stuff is poor, IMO)
the forgotten highlander
I've read it twice one the last 5 years
its amazing
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Forgotten-Highlander-Incredible-Survival/dp/0349122571
Sea Harrier over the Falklands by Sharkey Ward
The Big Show by Pierre Clostermann.
All about flying Typhoons in France between D Day and the end of WW2. Cracking read.
Another vote for Chickenhawk.
If you are fan of that you should try and get hold of a copy of [url= http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1908059036 ]Low Level Hell[/url].
Final one from me: [url= http://amzn.com/0891418024 ]Dustoff - The Memoir of An Army Aviator[/url].
The author Mike Novosell had a flying career spanning from the raids on Hiroshima / Nagasaki to flying Dust Off missions in Vietnam.
I will second operation Mincemeat and Agent ZigZig
Other War books that stick in my memory...
Das Boat
and related but not totally about War
the life story of Lawrence of Arabia ( Read a few can't remember exact titles )
All quiet on the western front, was a book that stuck with me.
+1 for chickenhawk, starky ward and first light. Ed Maceys 2 books about flying Apaches are good.
The quicksand war - lucien bodard french journalist - about the french in indo China before the Vietnam war, outstanding bit of work on forgotten history but copies are rare and expensive
No mean soldier by Peter Mcaleese.
From the sas to Rhodesia to South Africa in the 70s. Excellent book . Reread it every year.
Biggles 266 Squadron
The last valley - Martin Windrow
With the old breed - Percy sledge
Junior Officers Reading Club by Patrick Hennesey
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Junior-Officers-Reading-Club/dp/0141039264
Mark Urban - The tank war
Eric 'Winkle' Brown - Wings on my sleeve
E E Vielle - Almost a boffin
Robert Lyman - Slim, master of war
And Michael Gannon - Black May, about the defeat of the U-boats in the Atlantic, May 1943 being the turn around.
If you want wartime without any awesome man-action then CP Snow's Strangers and Brothers series is quite good.
Another from me,
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Requires a sharp mind, not a book to read yourself to sleep, but is riveting.
Forgotten soldier - guy sajer. Interesting to hear from the other side
Bomber - Len Deighton. Fiction but well researched etc.
First light - Geoffrey wellum
No mean soldier by Peter Mcaleese
Good book. My dad knew him, he said he was an animal.
I like Soldier I. Truly remarkable story and well written.
First light, as above - utterly brilliant.
Wing leader, JE 'Johnny' Johnson for a proper Spitfire special.
My wife is related to Robert Stanford Tuck, his log books and memoirs are astonishing.
The Cruel Sea, Nicholas Monseratt.
Truly humbling stuff. A novel but all based oh his service in the North Atlantic. The film is remarkable, the book will give you nightmares.
I think these were the forerunners to the Long Range Desert Group
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Popskis-Private-Army-Vladimir-Peniakoff-x/dp/B001KVFUAS
It's all about WWII in North Africa,well worth a read.
All quiet on the western front, was a book that stuck with me.
But it is only a novel, it isn't true. (I read it then found this out later and was very disappointed).
Personally I liked 'With The Jocks' - diaries from an officer in charge of a regiment but really not knowing why it was him or what he should do.
Or read anything by Primo Levi and be thankful for not being Jewish in the war.
Sea Harrier over the Falklands by Sharkey Ward
Beat me to it !
The Cruel Sea, Nicholas Monseratt.
And again
Can highly recommend Rick Jollys Red and Green Life Machine.
"Cruel sea" as others have said also "the operators" about northern island" was a good read
Chickenhawk, The Cruel Sea, The Jungle is Neutral, The Making of the Atomic Bomb.
Good thread, lads, cheers. Will be checking these out. Chickenhawk seems to be a good place to start
War in stringbag by Charles Lamb
For WW1, the three books by Peter Hart give an excellent indication of how the air war progressed:
Somme Success
Bloody April
Aces Falling
[url= http://www.amazon.co.uk/DAY-Through-German-Eyes-Hidden-ebook/dp/B00VX372UE ]http://www.amazon.co.uk/DAY-Through-German-Eyes-Hidden-ebook/dp/B00VX372UE[/url] and the 2nd book of the series. A short but very interesting read about a number of German troops who saw D Day from a very different perspective to the one we hear about. The author was a German Journalist who was in Normandy in June '44 and went looking for the people he'd interviewed before the invasion again in the 1950's.
Overlord, Max Hastings. D-Day onward, a really good book.
D-Day, Anthony Beevor, though I think Max Hastings was better.
Stalingrad by A. Beevor got great reviews when it was released, I didnt think it was a great read but it does go into detail about one of the pivotal battles.
More recent - War. Sebastian Junger, about the US in Afghan, made into the film Restrepo(sp?.)
Task Force Helmand, Doug Beattie, UK in Afghan.
Anthony Beevor - either Stalingrad, WW2 or Ardennes 1944. Another vote for Chickenhawk. Stephen E Ambrose books are quite good, he did Band of Brothers. The Forgotten Soldier by Guy Sajer is a good read but apparently questionable on how factually correct it is.
I also found Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes quite good. It's a fiction book and the far east but the author served in Vietnam winning the Navy Cross which is one below the Medal of Honor so I'm guessing there's a bit of fact in there amongst the story.
I know the OP wasn't interested in the Far East, however, this is best personal war memoir I have ever read.
[url= http://www.amazon.co.uk/Quartered-Safe-George-MacDonald-Fraser/dp/0007105932/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1455445801&sr=1-1&keywords=quartered+safe+out+here ]Quartered Safe Out Here - George McDonald Fraser[/url]
Regarding The Last Panther and D-Day German Eyes, I read them and really enjoyed them, but there are questions over their authenticity.
Same goes for The Forgotten Soldier, which I have read at least 3 times.
^^ Completely agree ref GMF's memoir.
Clostermann's The Big Show is highly recommended and IMO the best WW2 aviation memoir (although he was flying Tempests at the end of the war, not Typhoons). His Flames in the Sky is also superb as a collection of combat episodes although I believe the veracity of some of the events has been questioned subsequently.
An exceptional WW1 aviation memoir is Sagittarius Rising by Cecil Lewis.
For something a bit different, I Flew for the Fuhrer by Heinz Knoke is excellent.
Other WW2 flying memoirs I would recommend are:
Flying Start by Hugh Dundas
Tumult in the Clouds, James A Goodson
Night Fighter, CF Rawnsley and Robert Wright (Rawnsley was John 'Cat's Eye' Cunningham's Nav/Radar operator)
Fighter Pilot by Paul Ritchie - published during the war and surprisingly short on propaganda bull.
And finally the classic The Last Enemy by Richard Hilary, a much more reflective account of Battle of Britain combat.
Spies in the Sky by Taylor Downing is a good read about the aerial intelligence war.