Plutarch's Lives of The Noble Greeks and Romans

by

Guess Who: Plutarch

 I wasn't going to advocate for any particular version of his work, but this one from Amazon looks pretty good, and has many good reviews. It is:

https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Plutarch-Illustrated-Ancient-Classics-ebook/dp/B00C456HGU/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1489353390&sr=8-13&keywords=plutarch+lives

 Another thing it has going for it is that it is only $1.99 for the Kindle edition.

 The volume that I have is from when books were built like tanks. I paid more for it, but it has lasted more than forty years. It is not meant to be a straight biography of all these great, and not so great, men. It is meant by the author to show his own morals and how these men stacked up to them. The very great part about his books is that they are really the only biographies from anyone near the actual time they lived. Plutarch does get his moralizing in, but for the most part you also get the full biographies of his subjects in it.

 To those of us who are into Ancient history maybe you can relate. I was reading this book when my first child was being born. This was after the husband couldn't be in the room, and before we had to take classes to be in the room (I am still confused about the classes, because my role was pretty secondary to the action going on). The birth was imminent and my wife was surrounded by nurses and doctors. This birth was the only one during the daylight, so we had a lot of hands on deck. It was so crowded around my wife's bed that I couldn't even see her if I wanted to. So I stayed on the couch and read page after page of Plutarch. That is until a nurse came to me and said "Mr. Peterson you may want to see this". She was both right and wrong. Some of it was glorious to see, and some not so much. Anyway, the book has been with me during all of the most important times when I have had to wait around. I hope you find as much enjoyment out of it that I have.

Robert

 

 

Typhoon Over Moscow by T Broderick

and

Death on the Volga by T Broderick



 

 

Again my book of the week visits WW2 and the East Front fiction genre. Typhoon is the first book, Death on the Volga the second, not sure if there will be any  more in the series but I do hope so. They are both rather pricey in paperback (though I say worth it) however Kindle format are easily affordable and great value. The author is obviously a very keen historian and his research is impeccable. Nothing can ruin historical fiction more dramatically than historical errors and I have to say this is flawless. I can't find anything to raise even an eyebrow. Unlike my previous recommendation which followed a squad of Axis soldiers, here we have a whole host of characters, from both sides of the conflict, with no bias shown to either side.

 

Character development is very good, as is the narrative, for example battle scenes are exciting and you are there in the action and there is nothing that pulls you out from your imagination like some glaring historical error. Again this reads like a book written by an experienced author and a very good one at that. It's not stilted and flows well, conversations feel natural and not contrived to move the story along. There is no sign of an amateur author here like you can get with this type of novel. To be perfectly honest, if this had been an old war classic like say Life and Death I wouldn't have been surprised, it's written that well.

 

So if you have an interest in WW2 and fancy a great novel buy them! If you have an interest in the East front then definitely get them.

 

Highly recommended!

 

Jason

 


Edit: Sadly it's unlikely to be anymore, just noticed the publication dates!

In An Army at Dawn, Rick Atkinson offers a comprehensive telling of the 1942 invasion of North Africa by American and Allied forces.  The reader bears witness to every phase of what happened, from the very top decision makers, down through the ranks of officers, and finally to the tip of the spear. Even though you know the end of the story, Atkinson is able to put you in the moment, wondering, alongside the men in command, whether their forces will be able to get the job done.

The book covers a fascinating moment in the history of WW2: The before, during, and after of the first major clash between American and German ground forces. We all know history of what happened later on, the Allies rolled over Europe and into Germany, but what happened before all of that? This book covers a time when the American army was untested and hardly respected. Coming off of years spent with almost no military at all, they were now entering the single most violent and massive conflict in human history. It was little wonder that enemies and allies alike had doubts.

Atkinson has crafted my favorite kind of military history here. We see things from every perspective imaginable in the conflict. The stories of numerous individual soldiers are told in gripping detail, while their officers struggle with the burdens of command, and Eisenhower, overlooking it all, is forced to spend most of his time playing politics. At every level, Atkinson is both informative, and a good story teller.  Although the book mostly focuses on the American army, a decent number of pages are devoted to their allies and enemies, so you get a very complete picture of things. 

This book actually pushed me over the edge into buying the wonderful game Command Ops, as I finished reading it with a strong desire to capture the feeling of commanding a large ground force in battle, giving orders and then watching them filter down the chain of command.

An Army at Dawn is the first in a trilogy which goes on to cover the war in Italy and Western Europe in the same style. While I have not read the other two books yet, they are high on my list. If you are at all interested in the topic, this book will have you turning pages deep into the night.

- Joe Beard