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Books - What are you reading?


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Posted
26 minutes ago, 15[Span.]/JG51Spartan said:

If you liked the Rudel´s book, you must read this one ...

 

Memoirs of a Stuka Pilot (Helmut Mahlke).

 

You are in the cockpit while reading the book and feel part of the action. I love it!

:soldier:

 

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Likewise! https://www.amazon.co.uk/First-Light-Original-Penguin-Collection/dp/0141042753/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1544381489&sr=8-1&keywords=first+light

 

This one is brilliant. Have it on audiobook, and its a true story but feels like a novel really, and as you say makes you feel as if you are there. Kinda book that benefits greatly from a good narrator.

 

Really goes into the human side of things as well, not just the war, but the struggle to actually become a fighter pilot. At times I thought good lord, how many young pilots like him so desperately wanted the very thing that would end up getting them killed! Funny thing is I just finished the Geman aces speak (also have both volumes which are excellent) so I really came to see the human side of the German fighter pilots, and kinda felt for them hearing this book, in which they are mostly the hated (understandable) dehumanized enemy!

 

Do you know if Stuka pilot comes in audio format? Well, I shall check, cause I really wan't to hear a memoir of a stuka pilot!

 

German Stuka pilot! Can't imagine the odds were very good for those chaps, wot wot...

 

 

  • Upvote 1
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Wolf8312 said:

 

Likewise! https://www.amazon.co.uk/First-Light-Original-Penguin-Collection/dp/0141042753/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1544381489&sr=8-1&keywords=first+light

 

This one is brilliant. Have it on audiobook, and its a true story but feels like a novel really, and as you say makes you feel as if you are there. Kinda book that benefits greatly from a good narrator.

 

Really goes into the human side of things as well, not just the war, but the struggle to actually become a fighter pilot. At times I thought good lord, how many young pilots like him so desperately wanted the very thing that would end up getting them killed! Funny thing is I just finished the Geman aces speak (also have both volumes which are excellent) so I really came to see the human side of the German fighter pilots, and kinda felt for them hearing this book, in which they are mostly the hated (understandable) dehumanized enemy!

 

Do you know if Stuka pilot comes in audio format? Well, I shall check, cause I really wan't to hear a memoir of a stuka pilot!

 

German Stuka pilot! Can't imagine the odds were very good for those chaps, wot wot...

 

 

4

 

You will love that this one. I am still in the middle of the book and this pilot flew from the very beginning of the war in Poland. A lot of close calls that I will not tell you so I do not spoil the reading .... Now we are in Barbarossa!!! Every page is amazingly descriptive and well written. No politics at all, just a soldier in the call of duty.

Thanks for the FIRST LIGHT, I will certainly read it! :)

I am also looking for a BF110 Biography ... anyone? :gamer: 

Edited by 15[Span.]/JG51Spartan
Posted (edited)

This book in Danish is calling ' shoot down ' 

And it's a book all plane German / allies shoot down ww2 

And it's a very interesting book 

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Edited by Sire
!!!! Shoot down in Denmark !!!! ??
  • 2 weeks later...
Posted (edited)

Has anyone read this yet? I can hardly wait.

 

Woke Gaming, edited by Kishonna L Gray and David J Leonard

University of Washington Press, £23.50

"This eye-opening collection of essays serves to remind readers of the power and potential of games as a catalyst for change. According to its co-editor Kishonna L Gray, an assistant professor at the University of Illinois, games and gamers are imagining the world anew, amid a culture of dehumanising stereotypes, of hostility, harassment and erasure. Woke Gaming seeks to push readers to recognise persistent inequalities, as well as those who struggle for change within both our virtual worlds and in our everyday communities."

 

From the Guardian (where else?)

 

Meanwhile just finishing "Vietnam - and epic tragedy 1945-75", by Max Hastings. I like Hasting's prose style, which is plain but lively. This is a general reader's book that covers a wide sweep of history, but more interesting than many on VN as it does not devote hundreds of pages to obscure details of US politics, instead focusing on the overall goals and limitations faced by successive US presidents and other principal actors. Some specific accounts of the US air operations are interesting.

 

Overall message: fighting a war when you have not the material to win (the French), or the will to do whatever it takes (the US), or neither (the SVN government), may end up being worse than not fighting at all. Or possibly not, given how horrible and murderous the VC and NV Govt were, right up with the Khmer Rouge, all of whom really did know how to deliver "dehumanising stereotypes, of hostility, harassment and erasure".  Highly recommended even for non-Yanks.  

Edited by unreasonable
Posted

Just picked up "The Cancer Ward" by Solzhenitsyn.

 

It's Jordan Peterson recommended. ?

  • Upvote 1
Posted

Ted Barris (a great CDN writer of all things military has just published Dam Busters Unknown.jpg.07c9671f668569cb5f6c56c41fa54ffe.jpg

One great read!

  • 1 month later...
Posted

Reading "Chernobyl.  History of a Tragedy" by Serhii Plohy.  A Penguin paperback.

 

Bought it yesterday morning.

 

  The local firemen have just managed to get onto the roof of Unit 3 to fight the raging fires there.  The raging fires are caused by flaming blocks of graphite and fuel rod debris blown onto the roof when the core of reactor 4 exploded.........omg...omg....omg....:o:  

  • Sad 1
  • Upvote 4
Posted

Catastrophe 1914 Europe Goes To War - Max Hastings.

 

About 60% through it.

 

Mike.

Posted

Halfway through this one and enjoying it immensely.  Don't be put off by the cover.

 

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  • Like 1
Bremspropeller
Posted

Working on my 8th Air Force Fighter Groups collection.

Looks like there won't be anything about 20th FG :(

Posted
19 hours ago, DD_Arthur said:

Reading "Chernobyl.  History of a Tragedy" by Serhii Plohy.  A Penguin paperback.

This one is also great about the topic:

Truth About Chernobyl by Grigori Medvedev

 

He's a nuclear power expert who worked at the Chernobyl plant as well. Is is especially good if you are at least slightly familiar with the principle of nuclear decay and reactors.

Posted

The early years of aviation. Jolly good book this one.

 

 

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  • 1CGS
Posted

Finally finished Guns of August and have moved onto Where Have All the Soldiers Gone? Not the most exciting book, but informative nonetheless. 

 

 

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  • Haha 1
II/JG17_HerrMurf
Posted

Read Atkinson's An Army at Dawn (excellent/fascinating - it's amazing how badly we started in this war), slogged through The Day of Battle (tough read/very dry), and enjoyed The Guns at Last Light immensely.

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted (edited)

Amazing read for the Devs (and all of us, of course) in case they haven't read it yet .... It contains important information that can help to polish the FM, DM, etc. No technical data but pricelass info, IMHO

Krupiski also gives accounts of the JV44 and the Me262 ....

 

THE GERMAN ACES SPEAK

 

91chxF8BaNL.jpg Related image

 

 

Edited by 15[Span.]/JG51Spartan
Posted

I bought one of those as an audiobook.  The choice of narrator is terrible though and he has such a strong US accent that it completely breaks the narrative.  

Posted
2 hours ago, Feathered_IV said:

I bought one of those as an audiobook.  The choice of narrator is terrible though and he has such a strong US accent that it completely breaks the narrative.  

 

Better to have an English accent.

 

Even worked in Star wars.

  • Haha 1
Posted

He sounds like a sales rep from a Ford dealership.  :happy:

  • Sad 1
Posted
15 minutes ago, Feathered_IV said:

He sounds like a sales rep from a Ford dealership.  :happy:

 

Ouch.

 

I had Red Storm Rising (Clancy) read by F. Murray Abraham. He was good.

  • 2 months later...
unreasonable
Posted

Perhaps no-one reads much in the spring, mind is on other things...

 

Just finished two books, confusingly both called "Blueprint". They are both about the impact of genetic factors on behaviour.

 

That by Robert Plomin is more technical and narrowly focused. Nicholas Christakis has written a book easier to digest but that covers a wider range of issues, including whether morality has a natural, evolved basis. (Of course it does!) 

 

Both very good reads for anyone looking for some of the latest thinking on the old "nature/nurture" debate, and what it will mean for society in the future.

 

 

Chief_Mouser
Posted
On ‎2‎/‎4‎/‎2019 at 12:57 PM, Feathered_IV said:

Halfway through this one and enjoying it immensely.  Don't be put off by the cover.

 

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I have this one. Particularly liked the Channel Dash from a different (and unknown to me) viewpoint.

Cheers.

  • Upvote 1
Posted

Scramble by Tom Neil..I cannot recommend this book enough,an excellent read IMO.

 

 

 

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Posted

I've just finished this, which I stumbled across randomly...

 

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Very clearly influential to Ian Flemming, though enormously better written, Maugham's Ashenden stories are fictionalised accounts of his (actual) experiences as a British agent in Switzerland and Russia during WW1. 

 

The stories are often told with a very amusing dry wit, which should appeal to any fans of Kyril Bonfiglioli's 'Mortdecai' books. N.B. PLEASE don't confuse the Mortdecai books with the execrable recent Johnny Depp vehicle. These books are exceptional. They make me actually cry real tears of laughter.

 

 

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  • Upvote 1
Posted (edited)

With models 1/48 scale fore more recreation  illustrative: 

 

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Edited by RAY-EU
Posted

Thoroughly enjoying this at the moment.20190501_190335.thumb.jpg.aa116962df448055f18f11f200c9db9a.jpg

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  • Like 1
  • Thanks 1
Dogbert1953
Posted

Started last week..........................  1914: Voices From The Battlefields.

  • Upvote 2
Posted

The upvote is for the wisdom in your sig!

  • Thanks 1
  • 5 weeks later...
Posted

Reading 'It is bliss here - letters home 1939-45'  by Miles Hildyard.

 

I'd never heard of this man and picked it up from a bookstall in a local market last week on a whim.

 

It's fantastic;  Evelyn Waugh meets Chips Channon! 

Posted

I know they have been mentioned here before, but I am about 9 deep into the Aubrey/Maturin series and boy it just keeps getting better.

  • Upvote 4
Posted

The Sharpe and Harper of the Naval world..

 

  • Like 1
[CPT]Pike*HarryM
Posted

Just finished this, quite good. 

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Posted

Just picked up a few books online and plan on reading them when I chance.

 

Plan on starting these two first.

 

Stalingrad by Antony Beevor

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A Writer at War by Vasily Grossman

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Posted
On 2/3/2019 at 11:25 PM, DD_Arthur said:

Reading "Chernobyl.  History of a Tragedy" by Serhii Plohy.  A Penguin paperback.

 

Bought it yesterday morning.

 

  The local firemen have just managed to get onto the roof of Unit 3 to fight the raging fires there.  The raging fires are caused by flaming blocks of graphite and fuel rod debris blown onto the roof when the core of reactor 4 exploded.........omg...omg....omg....:o:  

I've seen that HBO show...that show ll give you the shakes...

  • 2 months later...
  • 1CGS
Posted

Finally, at long last, I started Shattered Sword today. This one is going to take a while. :) 

Posted
32 minutes ago, LukeFF said:

Finally, at long last, I started Shattered Sword today. This one is going to take a while. :) 

The book is so good, I practically ate it. So don't count on it taking a while. ;)

Posted
On 6/5/2019 at 7:36 AM, Cpt_Cool said:

I know they have been mentioned here before, but I am about 9 deep into the Aubrey/Maturin series and boy it just keeps getting better.

Love those books, I've read the whole series multiple times. Maturin's rant just before the battle at the end of HMS Surprise makes me smile every time! ?
It makes me wish I could convince the creators of Counterpart to write a gritty cloak-and-dagger spy thriller set during the Napoleonic wars.

  • Upvote 1
Posted
On 8/20/2019 at 3:55 PM, JG4_dingsda said:

The book is so good, I practically ate it. So don't count on it taking a while. ;)

 

Yep - I’ll be reading it again soon.

What with PTO coming and all...

  • Upvote 1
Posted

Quite interesting, especially in summer 1942, the fights in Kuban, with Tank Crew developing further, I'm thinking about building an original campaign with the ME

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  • 3 weeks later...

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