20th July 1944. Claus von Stauffenberg and others attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler by placing a suitcase bomb in his meeting room in Wolfsschanze. Hitler survives the attempt, and in the aftermath more than 7,000 German army personnel and civilians are arrested, of which almost 5,000 are executed. Not all of the arrested or executed […]
April 1944. Japanese forces attack the British colony of India. Traversing on foot through Burma, the Japanese troops reach and lay siege to the garrison town of Kohima. The purpose is to create inroads into the Indian mainland as well as disrupt the supply of arms and materiel from India to Chiang Kai-shek’s Chinese troops. […]
27th January 1945; the Red Army liberated the Auschwitz concentration camp during the Vistula-Oder Offensive. By then, more than a million people had been murdered there, and though most of the surviving prisoners were forced onto a death march by the retreating Nazis, about 7,000 had been left behind. The date is observed now as […]
Hailed as one of the most intense and thought-provoking reads in modern time, The Reader is a brilliant commentary on the generation that came after WW2. Growing up in the 1950s in the aftermath of the war, Bernhard Schlink articulates the emotions he and others like him went through, at a time when Germany was […]
Regardless of whether they are fans of historic fiction or not, you would be hard pressed to find someone who wouldn’t have heard of The Book Thief. Markus Zusak’s fifth book, it is his most acclaimed one, translated into more than 60 languages and a movie adaption. Its popularity and appeal come from two aspects […]
Special Forces and top-secret missions have always enthralled readers and writers alike, and the years of WW2 provide a rich hunting ground for both. The actions of the SOE and their “cousins across the pond” the OSS make for some pretty unbelievable tales, both real and fabricated, the secrecy surrounding the origins and the assignments […]
Wars and armies, even now for the most part are male dominated. Though there have been women not only fighting but proving instrumental in turning the tides of battle, they are either classified as exceptions or simply overlooked. This misogynistic sentiment is echoed through time, but that hasn’t stopped women from stepping up and donning […]
The Angry Hills is Leon Uris’ second novel, coming on the heels of his much-appreciated Battle Cry. As with most of his books, this too has a personal connection; his uncle – a Jewish Pioneer who migrated to Palestine – was a soldier in the Palestinian Brigade, part of the British Expeditionary Forces in Greece […]
After the emotional involvement in the seven-book Honor Bound Series, I wanted to go for something smaller and preferably unrelated, but I saw The ODESSA File in my library and I just had to pick it next. Though not related to each other, not even written by the same author, The ODESSA File segues into […]
This was the first time I reviewed a series as long and elaborate as this (and I’m sure it won’t be the last!). While I was posting it at my usual schedule of one every 15 days, there’s no reason for you to have to go to every post individually; you can check all of […]
War Crows 