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Great thread, I was always wondering why TBB was lacking something like this. Some books I can recommend.  Crucible of War A fantastic book on the Seven Years War(AKA The French and Indian War) and the effects that helped to bring on the American Revolution. The book is extremely well written (as well as concise) and doesn't feel like a chore at all to read through.  Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway This book gives a new perspective on the Battle of Midway and how the Japanese completely blew it by not adapting their strategies as The Pacific War really started to intensify. I used this book to help write my undergrad thesis and it's a great read if you have any interest in military or naval history. The authors are great guys too, I had a nice e-mail exchange with them when I was doing my research.  To Rule the Waves: How the British Navy Shaped the Modern World I loved this book since I'm an avid fan of naval history and this book is great at showing how the Royal Navy took shape from Henry VIII onward. I'd say the only two major criticisms I have with the book is that the bulk of it focuses on the Nelson and Elizabethan era and really feels like it just glances on Gunboat Diplomacy and the 20th century. Otherwise, it's a pretty solid read.  Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: Merchant Seamen, Pirates and the Anglo-American Maritime World, 1700 - 1750 Another one of my favorite books on Maritime/Naval History but more from the ground up perspective. Really good at dispelling a lot of the bullshit myths you hear about pirates in the 18th century as well as the reasons why many seamen joined up with them despite the risks. Also great for showing how seamen where the some of the most vocal guys in the labor movement before it was a thing. The author also goes into great detail about the wage and earnings systems in maritime society.  The Last Days of Innocence: America at War, 1917-1918 A pretty good summary of how the US entered World War I and the effects it had, social and economic. I really liked this book because while the majority of WW1 books I've read are great at explaining the European side of things and how futile many of the military efforts were, this book explains how much turmoil war brought to the social and economic landscape of America. I have a lot more recommendations on The Pacific War but I'll save those for another day. a-dogg posted:Speaking of Gordon Wood, his past review of Middlekauff's Glorious Cause makes it clear that the book particularly stresses the military conflict of the American Revolution, but I have not read the book itself so I can't speak to that. Puukko naamassa posted:The main focus is on the political and military aspects of the war (campaigns, backstage machinations, etc.), but the stories of regular people are also told, both soldiers (and especially on the Japanese side) civilians. To quote the back cover blurb, it weaves "together the historical facts and human drama leading up to and culminating in the war in the Pacific". Having nearly finished it myself, I'd certainly recommend it. Another book that's similar in the human drama vein is Japan at War. Think Studds Terkel's The Good War but focusing on the Japanese perspective instead.
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Jan 31, 2012 18:20
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baw posted:Hitler's Empire How was this? I've been interested in reading it for awhile so I'm looking for someone to nudge me towards it.
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Feb 5, 2012 19:42
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baw posted:I thought it was fantastic. It was pretty much perfect for my interests because the military conquests and defeats are mentioned in passing because the book mostly focuses on how the Reich was administered. It really shows just how poorly-run the entire mess was from the very start, with brutality and loyalty often being the most important qualifications for any post in the empire. And if you've read Manzowar before, you'll know that he knows how to write a gripping historical narrative. Sounds good to me. I've always felt the scholarship on how the Nazi's actually ran their "empire" was quite lacking, so this seems like it will be a great start before I move on to the Evans trilogy.
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Feb 6, 2012 15:27
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Are there any books someone can recommend that are good primers on The fall of the Second Spanish Republic and the Spanish Civil War? It seems to be a really fascinating topic but I know little about it other than the war was won by Franco and that Hitler had a hand in supporting him.
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May 1, 2012 19:03
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I've realized I have a very basic understanding of Irish (specifically the 20th Century and the War of Independence). Can anyone recommend some books focusing on the Easter Uprising and beyond?
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Nov 30, 2012 17:30
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Lee Harvey Oswald posted:I'm looking for a World War I book that focuses on the political/cultural aspects of the war. It seems like most basic overviews spend a disproportionate amount of time on the battles and military startegies. Kind of late but another book similar to what you're looking for is The Last Days of Innocence. Goes into great detail about the cultural, political and social ramifications in the United States as a result of entering the war.
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Dec 4, 2012 19:47
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Any books on the Korean War that someone can recommend to me other than The Coldest Winter?
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Feb 2, 2013 23:53
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Fontoyn posted:Most of the book is about killing in combat, psychological trauma etc. We had a pretty good discussion about the book going in Goons in Platoons awhile back. http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3454883&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=3 Basically, he excels when talking about psychology, but is pretty bad when he tries his hand at sociology and such. He also completely ignores what Marshall's goals were when he conducted his studies. Some choice quotes, quote:While Grossman's overall points about combat stress/PTSD/etc are good, it's worth mentioning that the SLA Marshall "study" about the whole "less than 25% of U.S. infantrymen in WWII fired their weapons" thing is pretty much bullshit, which undercuts Grossman's line of thought a bit (article from Parameters supporting that fact). The whole point of Men Against Fire was to serve as a jumping off point for convincing the insanely overly conservative Army to start devoting more time for combat oriented training for draftees as opposed to the WWII method of a lot of PT, some marksmanship, and field exercises, not to serve as an accurate history. It had to be framed as a "history" otherwise the brass would've told him to go piss up a rope with his new-fangled "theories" about how to train troops in this "art of combat" thing as opposed to the good ol' fashioned 'Murican training of tons of push-ups and shooting slow fire at paper at 500 meters that had worked for every generation of soldiers before them . So his goal was laudable, but the issue comes with people failing to recognize the flaws in his "methodology" (and I use that term loosely) and therefore accepting it at face value as accurate history, when it was really a (good) opinion masquerading as history to get his point across to the decrepit ancient old retards that were running the Army. quote:These are both great books. However when he starts to dip into sociology in On Killing (mostly the stuff concerning media/video games and urban drug violence) I feel like his argument is flawed and slightly off base when compared to the great stuff he writes using psychology as a basis rather than sociology. quote:Agreed. He also coauthored a book entirely about that. I found it pedantic, strident and terribly repetitive. His time would be much better spent trying to educate the American public and media about the realities of combat stress so they can understand things like this a little better. For someone with such valuable views he seems to somehow have missed the chance to really help a lot of people and get his face and name out there (really, how many times could he have appeared on the 24/7 news networks over the last 11 years). TLDR: He's really good when he talks about the psychology behind killing and being trained to do so, but he's way off when he starts pointing fingers at video games for the reason behind large scale urban violence.
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Feb 19, 2013 16:20
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barkingclam posted:If you want a social history, maybe check out some of Studs Turkel's work? This. Go read The Good War and Hard Times by Turkel. Both are about the depression era/WW2 from an American Perspective and completely blow the poo poo out of TGG. When you're done and if you want more social history, Cooks Japan At War is another excellent social/oral history. Handsome Ralph fucked around with this message at 05:39 on Mar 6, 2013 |
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Mar 6, 2013 05:32
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DerLeo posted:Beevor I liked, but for a single volume work I'd think about looking into John Keegan's treatment, which I believe is also simply called The Second World War. While Keegan's work is excellent (and I recommend reading at somepoint no matter what book you choose), I'd recommend Hasting's/Beevor's books as a first read nowadays since they were written after the Soviet Union collapsed and Hasting's/Beevor's /scholarship in general had a better picture of what was going on on the Eastern Front.
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Apr 3, 2013 20:07
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blakout posted:Does anyone have a suggestion for a good book about The Great Depression? Popular or Academic long as its interesting I don't really care. Studs Terkel's Oral History Hard Times is really good.
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Nov 27, 2013 06:02
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Hammerstein posted:Just received it in the mail and will dig in over the weekend. Thanks for the recommendation, I already wanted to buy it after seeing several reviews but found no Kindle version, got it as paperback now. I read this book for the Japanese perspective, The Pacific War: 1931-1945, a few years back for my thesis capstone. I recall it being a pretty good read.
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Feb 28, 2014 17:13
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TheFallenEvincar posted:I'd also like to read more on the Korean War perhaps. I've always had an outside grasp of the whole thing, more like how the Korean War fit into the Cold War and how it affected X or Y, not the actual details of the conflict and maybe stuff about the clash between Truman and MacArthur. Having recently read Philip Roth's novel Indignation, set during the Korean War, and having read the awesome novel The Orphan Master's Son, I have been starting to think more on the Korean War and how little I know about the actual events of it (vague things about the Chinese and those POWs who ended up staying with the North Koreans/Chinese). Coldest Winter by David Halberstam is pretty good, but is focused almost entirely on the American perspective/experience. It also does a pretty good job of showing how badly MacArthur and Ned Almond botched things up (and in my opinion, how Matthew Ridgeway is one of the most underrated American commanders of the 20th century). Max Hastings's The Korean War is supposed to be pretty good as well, but is more well rounded and looks at the various UN nations that participated in the conflict rather than just the U.S. for the most part.
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Oct 14, 2014 19:54
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End Of Worlds posted:Anyone have a suggestion for a light, perhaps narrative history of the Napoleonic Wars? Echoing this request.
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Mar 31, 2015 20:28
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AdjectiveNoun posted:It might be medium rather than light, but I would always recommend The War of Wars, by Robert Harven It's utterly fantastic. That's perfect, thanks!
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Apr 1, 2015 01:03
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walgreenslatino posted:I'm looking for a book on Allied treatment of Axis combatants and POWs. Specifically about retaliation for Malmedy, summary execution of prisoners, that sort of thing. I once read a portion of a really excellent book dealing with the subject, but now I can't find it for the life of me From pages back but this book was recommended to me awhile ago. Not sure how it is but I trust the person's judgement who recommended it to me. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0700617175/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pd_S_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=2KA85VB2Y77BV&coliid=I3RM9MQNOSHHKU
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Nov 12, 2015 17:08
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So I've started reading Massie's Castles of Steel and holy gently caress I'm mad at myself for buying it two years ago and not starting it till now. Any similar books that people can recommend? I've already read Shattered Sword and I know Dreadnaught is supposed to be good as well. Also interested in finding a few good books on u-boats during WWII and the sinking of the Bismarck.
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May 31, 2016 16:36
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smr posted:I'd recommend reading Dreadnaught first, then Castles of Steel, since the latter is effectively a sequel to the former. I realize that that's like a 1200-page commitment because Massie. Yeah I'm already about 300 pages into Castles of Steel, so I'll likely go back and read Dreadnaught afterwards. From what I've heard, it won't detract from either book reading them that way.
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Jun 1, 2016 16:17
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