What Are You Reading?

Gordon Rottman : Okinawa 1945- the last battle

 

Reading The Nazi Hunters by Ashmam & Spitfire dive bombers V the V2

 

Thanks for the comments and I'll try to answer the queries.

Funnily, I never looked at Normandy without covering July 20, not least because so many middle and senior ranking officers were involved to greater or lesser extents. I probably did get a bit bogged down in events in Berlin/Rastenburg with hindsight... but I wanted to tell the story without sending readers scurrying for other books on the plot. The downside is that it really does break the narrative of the Normandy battles. Sorry.

Looking back (it was written 4-5 years ago), there's a lot today I'd do differently. Too many long quotes. It needs more images (I was severely hindered by cost ) and more and better maps. One good thing was that the publishers asked for the manuscript to be chopped by about one third; that was an excellent lesson because there was a lot of material in the original version which was superfluous. I did lose the Brittany campaign though which was a bummer.

Anyway, next up is the Polish campaign which comes out next summer. It's similar in style (narrative not serious military history), but it's IMHO a much better read. I cannot, however, promise that it doesn't wander off at tangents from time to time.

 

Been reading a few titles from the Osprey Fortress series all them good but always best to pick them up as cheap as possible.

(Fortress 3)
U-Boat Bases and Bunkers 1941–45

(Fortress 23)
German Field Fortifications 1939–45

(Fortress 45)
German Defences in Italy in World War II

(Fortress 62)
Soviet Field Fortifications 1941–45

 

I've got the Battleground Europe "Cassino" sitting in front of me and an old 1978 title coming which I am most interested in brousing through as the fall rains appear this weekend. "Fw 200 Kondo, Scourage of the Atlantic" by Kenneth Poule

 

! This reminds me of that famous WWII 'Fougasse' cartoon poster : 'You never know who's listening !'

Many thanks for the response, 'halder' and welcome to the WWII Forums.

I hope we weren't too harsh on your efforts. Despite my niggles, the book now sits on my Normandy shelf where it rubs shoulders with Carell, Belfield/Essame,D'Este, Keegan et al so it most certainly hasn't been despatched to the charity shop....

Thanks for your efforts with the book ; the German side of the Normandy campaign story is woefully neglected for the English-language reader.

 

Eddy Florentin's "The Battle of the Falaise Gap" has now arrived from USA!. It is most welcome! And as I am not so very fast in reading in other languages than swedish, the book will "brighten" my days for a long time.

Mats

 

Careless talk...

If it sits alongside Carell, D'Este et al then I'm in good company. As long as there's no Franz Kurowski or Charles Whiting.

Actually the comments on here is the first criticism I've had so far (reviews, apart from on Amazon and Feldgrau/AHF have been few and far between, though). It's highly unlikely I'll revise it, much as it needs tweaking, as I've too many other projects to write...

 

Having just finished Mark Urban's very good UK Eyes Alpha I'm now rattling through (at quite phenomenal pace) Dan Todman's The Great War: Myth and Memory, which is proving remarkable in that I'm agreeing with practically every word he's written.

When I get a spare 5 minutes I'll finish reading Guide to US forces serving in Iraq 1943. I've also got Richard Holmes' Sahib to read at some point as well.

 

No ! Any Kurowski or Whiting which have escaped the charity shop are relegated to pile-on-the-floor-of-the-spare-room status. Yours and the others are Normandy-shelf-in-the-living-room....

 

Franz needs to stick with just Ost from memories....his Bridgehead Kurland isn't that bad............well ah, he has a strong influence of spider-webbing and then continues off beat in other chapters. numbing actually, and dang he did not mention anything in that title of the great ground attack and rescue of German truppen by Ju 88G-6's of NJG 100 in 45.

 

Been reading Thomas Jentz' "Germany's Tiger tanks." This morning, same author's "Germany's Panther tanks" arrived.

 

Just bought ace Peter Düttmann´s book translated in Finnish originally called "Wir kämpften in einsamen Höhen".


He fought since summer 1943 in ostfront and gathered 152 kills.

 

Starting THE ROAD TO BERLIN!!!

~JOHN ERICKSON


Man its been a while since I have had the pleasure of reading this one

 

just received the neu Christian Schmidt OHG Katalog 2008

interesting stuff inside, with several old German titles now rehashed with new covers, one book looks interesting to me : nw item, U-boot Krieg im Gulf von Mexiko 42-43. did you know that 56 Allied ships were sunk in the gulf bei U-booten ? interviews from both sides of the crazy sea battles...

around 25.00 Euros

 

almost finished with "The Hidden Life of Otto Frank:, very interesting, they go into who betrayed them and what happened to that person and alot of others who turned in Jews for money.

 

Just beginning to "Teething" my copy of: Hitler's Legions.

For those who never heard of it, this book is considered one of the, if not THE Bible; of WWII German Orbat books. This is one of the main books that the owner of Feldgrau, got his info from. Another is a long OOP title called: German Order of Battle 1944 - which was originally first published in 1944 after D-Day. The last publication I know of for this book was by: Greenhill Publications-I don't remember what year? Late 1990's or about 2000?

Anyway, Hitler's legions corrects and fills-in-alot-of-the-holes, that German Order of Battle had. Both are great books none the less.

 

Finished reading "Tigers in the mud".....Stackpole books. In the very back of this book, there is a list of what looks like some more great reading by Stackpole.

Armor Battles of the Waffen SS among a few.

Stackpole Books Store

 

Finished Helmut Günther´s "Hot motors and cold feet" and enjoyed it truly. Perhaps even better than "Guy Sajer" and Helmut has lots of pics and stories in the book so it´s a true story. Looking forward to the part II " The eyes of the division".

A & J Arms Booksellers: HOT MOTORS, COLD FEET COVER : by Helmut. Gunther . - Military and Gun Books

 

Rec'd and read it all today.

German Invasion Plans for the British Isles 1940

A five year dossier of information of Britain, it's one of the only surviving copies found by the Allied forces as they invaded Berlin in 1945.

Don't get your hopes up folks it's more to do about us Brits, our class system along with roads and rail and the lay of the land etc, etc. More of an interest to anyone here in Britain.