Books set during wartime

[Echo]

I don't know if this would fit, but Simon's Family by Marianne Friedrickson is partly set during WWII in Sweden. And the rest of the book deals with the fallout of the war.

[Janet]

I don't know if this would fit, but Simon's Family by Marianne Friedrickson is partly set during WWII in Sweden. And the rest of the book deals with the fallout of the war.

I'd like to read that, because I have a Swedish friend, but I can't find it. Where did you get it from?

 

ETA: I've found it on Amazon Marketplace.

[Sedge]

Growing up, one of my favourite children's book was The Machine Gunners by Robert Westall. Has anybody else read it?

[poppy]

Although quite dated, I really enjoyed Nevil Shute's books set during during WWII. Ones that I particularly liked were 'Requiem for a Wren' and 'Pied Piper'. The latter is about an old man who rescues seven abandoned children in France during the Nazi invasion.

[Kell]

I recently started reading The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, which is set a the tail-end of WWII, but I couldn't get into it at all. Maybe I'll come back to it one day, but not for a while - it just wasn't appealing to me at all.

[Echo]

I'd like to read that, because I have a Swedish friend, but I can't find it. Where did you get it from?

 

ETA: I've found it on Amazon Marketplace.

 

 

It may be more available here in the States...I think I just picked it up at a book store, or I got it on Amazon. I honestly don't remember! but if you can find anything by Marianne Friedrickson, read it! I've read Hannah's Daughters (excellent) and Two Women (also excellent). I'll put some reviews up soon.

[samgrosser]

I recently started reading The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, which is set a the tail-end of WWII, but I couldn't get into it at all. Maybe I'll come back to it one day, but not for a while - it just wasn't appealing to me at all.

 

What a shame you didn't get into it - it's one of my favourite all time books! But beyond the beauty of the language it is hard work and I'm sure there's a lot of it that went completely over my head.

 

Maybe one to come back to then.

[jenmck]

Well, for actual "war" books I read non fiction (Winston Churchill, Barbara Tuchman and others).

The best book I've read that were written during WWII don't really involve the war at all. Ngiao Marsh's books "Died In The Wool" and "Color Scheme" are both set during the war. They're brilliant.

[happyanddandy]

The book I'm currently reading, Andrea Levy's Small Island, provides some read food-for-thought about the West Indian volunteers for the British Armed Forces in WWII (particularly when juxtaposed with black American GI's. I was so shocked, perhaps naively).

 

 

I agree it was horrible to read about the prejudice. Heart rending that

Queenie felt she had to reliquish her baby because of it.

As I was reading I knew that was going to happen

[pontalba]

I have read and enjoyed Suite Francaise and only wish she had been able to live to complete it.

Another by Erich Maria Remarque, Arch of Triumph was an excellent read, and I have Kenny to thank as I bought that as well as The Night in Lisbon...the latter yet unread. So far.

 

I'd seen the film with Charles Boyer AoT, many years ago.

 

Oh, another author mentioned up the thread Nevil Shute wrote A Town Called Alice, a good bit of it takes place in WWII. It is based on the true story of the forced march in Sumatra of the women and children.

[SteffieB]

Yes, definitely the Book Thief. So well done.

 

Has anyone else read any of the Maisie Dobbs books? I like the Florence Nightingale aura they have, although WWI instead of the Crimean war, and with realistic problems like brain injury, etc, that people tend to overlook. These books made me realize that death isn't the only awfulness that happens, and also consider the emotional toll on people who weren't fighting but instead taking care of those who did.

[finrod]

No pretence that this is a definitive list, my recommendations include (I try not to repeat suggestions already made):

 

Peloponnesian War (431 - 404 BC, Athens v Sparta)

Goat Song, Frank Yerby

The Last of the Wine,Mary Renault

 

Arthur

The Great Captains, Henry Treece

Sword at Sunset, Rosemary Sutcliffe

 

Alfred

The King of Athelney,Alfred Duggan

 

Athelstan

The Half Brothers (cannot remember author)

 

Clontarf (1014, Ireland)

The Kings in Winter, Cecelia Holland (Vikings and irish)

 

1066

The Firedrake, Cecelia Holland

The Crusades

History:

The Crusades (Vols I-IV), Sir Steven Runciman, vivid, gripping history

Literature:

The Alexiad, Anna Comnena (but also used as a history source being largely contemporary

Count Bohemond, Alfred Duggan (imho his finest, it also draws directly from Alexiad)

 

Seven Years War/Indian wars (1756-1763)

The Last of the Mohicans, The Pathfinder, James Fenimore Cooper

Northwest Passage, Kenneth Roberts (first half made into an excellent 1940 film)

 

American War of Independence

Sergeant Lamb of the Ninth, Robert Graves

Drums Along the Mohawk, Walter D Edmonds (made into a great film by John Ford, the film is even better, showing different balanced viewpoints (both patriot and loyalist).

 

American Civil War

History:

The Civil War, Ken Burns (some may remember the excellent TV series, the war is told via contemporary photographs, and extracts from diarists, letters, with annotations from historians.

Literature:

The March E L Doctorow (Sherman's 600 mile march to the sea)

The Great War (& Russian Civil War)

History :

Facing Armageddon, various, edited by Hugh Cecil & Peter Liddle - 64 scholars from all over the globe examine the experience of the First World War from many perspectives (including military, home front, occupation etc) -

The First World War, Hew Strachan

The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T E Lawrence

Tommy, Richard Holmes

anything by Gary Sheffield

Literature :

The Middle Parts of Fortune, Frederic Manning (esteemed by military historians as an authentic account, as the author saw front-line service in the war), bowdlerised version Her Privates We.

Slow Approach of Thunder, Konstantin Paustovsky (part of autobiographical work, rejected for military service due to short-sightedness, author became a medical orderly)

With the Armies of the Tsar, A Nurse at the Russian Front in War and Revolution, 1914-1918,Frances Farmborough

Doctor Zhivago, Boris Pasternak

And Quiet Flows the Don and The Don Flows Home to the Sea, Mikhail Sholokhov, beautiful sweeping account of various Don Cossacks, men and women, rich and poor, bolsheviks and whites.Second World War

Life and Fate, Vasily Grossman, Stalingrad and account of Jewish nuclear scientists in Soviet Russia, German POW camp etc

[Kell]

I was just thinking, the Roman seris of books by Simon Scarrow are all war-based. The first one, Under the Eagle is set during the 43AD Roman invasion of Britain. The whole series is excellent!

 

Scarrow has also started a series set during the Napoleonic war, starting with Young Bloods and continuing with The Generals. I have the first one (although I've not read it yet) and am hoping to get the rest of the series as they come out.

[Guest ii]

I don't know if this would fit, but Simon's Family by Marianne Friedrickson is partly set during WWII in Sweden. And the rest of the book deals with the fallout of the war.

 

I'm sorry, I know I haven't read the book, and therefore shouldn't say anything, but I just find that highly contradicting. Sweden didn't participate in any ways to the WWII. They pulled Switzerland. What they did, was take in Finnish children who were sent away from the throes of war. That's about it.

 

I'm sorry, as someone who just celebrated the 90th anniversary of the Finnish Independence, listening to the stories of people who were actually there, fighting in the war agaist an opponent ten times as big and much better equipped, defending that independence, I find it hard to believe a book set in Sweden, even if taking place during the war years, would in any way qualify as a war book. I might be wrong, but that's just how I feel. It's like French people writing about the beauty of other languages, what do we know about that?!

 

I recently started reading The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, which is set a the tail-end of WWII, but I couldn't get into it at all. Maybe I'll come back to it one day, but not for a while - it just wasn't appealing to me at all.

 

I really liked The English Patient, both the book and the movie. Have you seen it?

 

edit: Has anyone here read Upon a wheel of fire by Paul Grieve? I have it on my TBR pile, bought years ago, and I've often meant to read it, just never gotten to it.

[Echo]

I'm sorry, I know I haven't read the book, and therefore shouldn't say anything, but I just find that highly contradicting. Sweden didn't participate in any ways to the WWII. They pulled Switzerland. What they did, was take in Finnish children who were sent away from the throes of war. That's about it.

 

I'm sorry, as someone who just celebrated the 90th anniversary of the Finnish Independence, listening to the stories of people who were actually there, fighting in the war agaist an opponent ten times as big and much better equipped, defending that independence, I find it hard to believe a book set in Sweden, even if taking place during the war years, would in any way qualify as a war book. I might be wrong, but that's just how I feel. It's like French people writing about the beauty of other languages, what do we know about that?!

 

Well, it's been a while since I've read it and there's a lot I don't remember. One of the families portrayed in the book is Jewish, and the young son has a complete nervous breakdown because of the war, and his father is forced to take in family members who have come out of concentration camps. There's also a dangerous secret about the main character that puts his life at risk. They all live by the sea and are witness to sea fighting between the Norwegians and the Germans. And there's always a fear that the Germans were going to invade. It's definitely an alternative view of the war, but it's very interesting nonetheless.

[R L Royle]

Our Kid by Billy Hopkins is a beautiful book of Billy's experience as a child growing up in Manchester during WW2. It's one of the few fiction books I've read again and again.

[JudyB]

Our Kid by Billy Hopkins is a beautiful book of Billy's experience as a child growing up in Manchester during WW2. It's one of the few fiction books I've read again and again.

 

 

I read this quite a few years ago and thought it was brilliant. I started to read the whole series and see newer books coming into the library. I'd love to pick the series up again but can't remember after all this time where I'm up to.

[Guest ii]

During the holidays I remembered this topic and realised I'd forgotten one very good book. Väinö Linna's The Unknown Soldier. I cannot believe I forgot that. It follows a group of men during the Continuation War (around the time of WWII, first Soviets started a war on Finland, the Winter War, and we lost some territories. Then we started the Continuation War, to try to get those back.)

 

Anyways, it's a really brilliant book, and highly recommended to everyone. Just make sure you get a translation that kept the different dialects of the characters.

[writeoff]

Khaled Hosseini writes about Afghanistan although the conflict is secondary to the interractions between the characters and their growth. What I particularly like about The Kite Runner is that the main charater is flawed but you can't help feeling for him.

[Roman blood]

generals is very good

[Suzanne123]

I watched The English Patient film which I really enjoyed! So, I decided to get the book to read, and guess what... I hated it! I don't know why because I really loved the film, but I just really hated the book!

[Ravenwood]

I've just finished The Book Thief and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas - yes October was just a barrel of laughs.

Before that we had Mister Pip, and now I'm onto The Book of Lost Things.... think I see a pattern developing here.

[Suzanne123]

I really wanna read 'The Boy in the Stripped Pyjamas' cause I really liked the film, but... I really liked 'The Engliah Patient' film and hated the book

[Raven]

I find that some of the most interesting stories that I have read have been set during wartime, notably World War II. I do not simply mean for the action side of things, but for interactions among the people involved - both military and civilian. It might be because desperate situations often tend to bring out the best...and worst from people.

 

Here is a small list of some of the best wartime stories that I have read so far. If any of you are interested in those times, I would recommend these.

 

1. The Night of the Generals by H H Kirst

2. The Magic Army by Leslie Thomas

3. The Bormann Brief by Clive Eagleton

4. The Wooden Wolf by John Kelly

5. KG 200 by John Gilman

6. Hammerstrike by Walter Winward

 

If you are interested in books set during WWII, the one I'm re-reading at the moment, Enigma, by Robert Harris, is well worth a read (though as Fatherland is listed as your favourite book, I'm guessing you may have come across it already!).

On the non-fiction side, I can also recommend The Hardest Day, by Alfred Price. I read it earlier this year and it is an account of a single days action - from midnight to midnight - during the Battle of Britain. It's an interesting read!

Growing up, one of my favourite children's book was The Machine Gunners by Robert Westall. Has anybody else read it?

I vaguely remember the TV series!

[Guest Vince]

If you fancy something current try Sniper One by Sgt Dan Mills, story of an Infantry Regiment in Iraq or Eight Lives Down by Chris Hunter, his story of a bomb disposal operator also in Iraq. Both are first hand accounts of modern warfare & the fight against terrorism.