I consider FDR the greatest of all presidents for leading America with distinction in the domestic crisis of the Great Depression and the foreign crisis of World War 2 and creating the modern presidency that survives today in the essential form he established. I have written books on Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, and Ronald Reagan during fifty years as a US history professor in UK universities. I always intended to write a book about how FDR reinvented the presidency that these Republicans inherited, something I finally did in ‘retirement’. My five chosen books explain the challenging times he faced and the leadership skills he displayed in meeting them.
This is a vivid retelling of the US production miracles that enabled America and its Allies to win World War 2. Instead of overwhelming readers with dry numbers, the book comes alive by focusing on the human dimension. Klein credits FDR for understanding that the US had to become the ‘Arsenal of Democracy’ to win the war, while lionizing innovative industrialists and engineers who turned this vision into reality and the federal officials who cleared the way for their operations to succeed. He also highlights the struggles of the millions who endured disruption and discomfort in migrating to undertake war work far from their home regions. This is essential reading to understand the home front in America’s greatest foreign war.
The colossal scale of World War II required a mobilization effort greater than anything attempted in all of the world's history. The United States had to fight a war across two oceans and three continents--and to do so, it had to build and equip a military that was all but nonexistent before the war began. Never in the nation's history did it have to create, outfit, transport, and supply huge armies, navies, and air forces on so many distant and disparate fronts.
The Axis powers might have fielded better-trained soldiers, better weapons, and better tanks and aircraft, but they could…
Almost all of my books have been historical novels, but this one is the one most dear to me, an attempt to understand the fault line that the Vietnam War laid across American society, leaving almost every man of my generation with scars physical or psychic. My picks are all books that illuminate the multiple upheavals of that time.
Winter Soldiers offers firsthand accounts of more than thirty of members of Vietnam Veterans Against the War, some of whom first joined the military with a deep belief in the rightness of America’s role in that conflict.
Eventually they made common cause with the protesters against the war and their voices had a role in its ending. Winter Soldiersfollows them from their lives before the war, through their service, and into its aftermath.
In 1971, Vietnam veterans testified in public hearings about atrocities they had participated in or witnessed during the war. Here, Stacewicz seeks to tell their story by interviewing more than 30 members of Vietnam Veterans Against War and draws on their archives for supporting evidence.
I work in aviation, so it was natural to write about it when I started as a freelance writer. But I quickly realized that writing about aviation people is much more interesting than writing about airplanes. Because of my military background I found myself writing veterans’ stories. I’ve uncovered many stories that have never been told or have been forgotten over the years. And because I was in the Air Force in the 1980s and 1990s, I knew the events in my new book had never been told. During my research, I found more books with hidden histories and rediscovered some I read decades ago. This list is my favorites.
This book represents another facet of military women, those with a double whammy: Black women. This was especially a problem during WWII, when the army still practiced segregation and initially prohibited Black women from serving overseas, unlike their white counterparts.
After pressure from groups such as the NAACP and intervention by President Roosevelt, the army formed the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion as an all-Black Women’s Army Corps unit. About 850 women served in the 6888th, which was stationed in the UK and France from January 1945 until March 1946. The unit was responsible for routing mail to about 7 million U.S. personnel who served in the European Theater of Operations.
This “double whammy” is a topic that I hope is explored more in future books!
The story of the historic 6888th, the first United States Women's Army Corps unit of African American women to serve overseas
While African American men and white women were invited, if belatedly, to serve their country abroad, African American women were excluded for overseas duty throughout most of WWII. However, under political pressure from legislators like Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., the NAACP, the Black press, and even President Roosevelt, the US War Department was forced to deploy African American women to the European theater in 1945.
African American women answered the call to serve from all over the country, from…
I grew up a fan of all things sci-fi, Star Wars, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, and so on. But the older I got, the pickier I got, wanting more depth in character, creative stories and fun, but believable action. I read classic sci-fi like iRobot, Starship Troopers, and Enders Game, to name a few. I did find some contemporary authors I liked like Marco Kloos, Detmare Wehr, and Rebecca Branch, but they were needles in a haystack. So, instead of complaining that there were not enough good books out there, I started writing my own. A decade later I have 8 published titles and more on the way.
I first discovered this book as an audiobook several years ago. It was recommended as something similar to Starship Troopers, which I had recently finished. The beginning of the book didn’t grab me at first. As a matter of fact I started to think it was a rip-off of Starship Troopers. But there was something about the main character that made me want to stay to the next chapter. Andrew Grayson is a young man who is very bright, but because he lives in a welfare community in the not-so-distant future, his prospects are limited. One of the only ways he can get out of the PRCs (what the author refers to as the projects) is to join the military. What makes this book work so well is the fact that Andrew is not really special. He is smart and usually a little more capable than the people around him.…
"There is nobody who does [military SF] better than Marko Kloos. His Frontlines series is a worthy successor to such classics as Starship Troopers, The Forever War, and We All Died at Breakaway Station." -George R. R. Martin
The year is 2108, and the North American Commonwealth is bursting at the seams. For welfare rats like Andrew Grayson, there are only two ways out of the crime-ridden and filthy welfare tenements: You can hope to win the lottery and draw a ticket on a colony ship settling off-world . . . or you can join the service.
I have been reading about W.E.B. Du Bois since graduate school. He’s a fascinating character in American history who is always surprising me.
In this book, Chad Williams finds an unpublished 800-page manuscript in the archives at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and gives the reader a peak into the complexities of Du Bois’s brain. Having read nearly everything Du Bois wrote as I use his work in my own historical writings, I had never seen this side of Du Bois.
For the first time, followers of Du Bois’s work can see how World War I shaped him, his political evolution, and his later work. Williams’ book tackles Du Bois’s notion of double consciousness (being Black and American) within the context of fighting for one’s country and demonstrates how Du Bois originally thought he could reconcile being Black and American during the war but eventually became disillusioned.
The dramatic story of W. E. B. Du Bois's reckoning with the betrayal of Black soldiers during World War I―and a new understanding of one of the great twentieth-century writers.
When W. E. B. Du Bois, believing in the possibility of full citizenship and democratic change, encouraged African Americans to “close ranks” and support the Allied cause in World War I, he made a decision that would haunt him for the rest of his life. Seeking both intellectual clarity and personal atonement, for more than two decades Du Bois attempted to write the definitive history of Black participation in World…
I'm the internationally recognized expert on work-life balance, harmony, and integrative issues, and since 2009, hold the registered trademark from the USPTO as the “Work-Life Balance Expert®." I'm the author of several popular books including Breathing Space; Everyday Project Management; Simpler Living; and 60 Second Organizer. Delivered with passion, I offer his cutting edge, hands-on strategies for a balanced career and life to audiences from Singapore to San Diego, with clients as diverse as Novo Nordisk, Worthington Steel, Lufthansa, American Law Institute, and the National Association of Realtors. I've been a guest on Late Night with Charlie Rose, CNBC, America in the Morning, the Australian Broadcasting Company, and USA Today Sky Radio.
I think that General Pagonis wrote an instant classic. On the battlefield in Iraq, Pagonis began and ended every day by asking, what do we do if Saddam attacks today? I held large classes, he recalls, open to anyone, but especially to our talented reserve forces, to discuss scenarios and potential solutions.
He would ask questions like, "A ship docked at Ad Dammam this morning. It's ready to be unloaded, but the onboard crane breaks. What do you do?" Or, "We suddenly find out we're receiving 15,000 troops today instead of the usual 5,000. How do we adjust to the increase?"
He constantly told people that we all needed to do our Monday-morning quarterbacking on Saturday night, before problems arose. I and everyone I know could benefit from such a policy. The added benefit of this approach was that it promoted collaborative talks about problems and responsibilities across ranks and…
"Business Week" described the Gulf War as "the largest military logistics operation in history", entailing an unprecedented deployment of troops and supplies halfway around the world. Here is a firsthand account of the supply effort that led to the dramatic Allied victory in the Gulf, written by the general who spearheaded the remarkable undertaking. General Pagonis recounts the Gulf War from the first fateful telephone call, to the mobilization of 550,000 troops and the shipment of 7,000,000 tons of supplies, to the enormously complex challenge of bringing home a half million soldiers and their equipment. Numerous leadership and logistics lessons…
For fifty years I've studied the British sailing navy, fascinated by its workings, the slow communications, the vagaries of the winds and tides. In parallel with my work in archives, I've sailed in most of the European waters described in Convoys. I worked at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, for 27 years, leaving as Deputy Director in 2000. Since then, I've taught postgraduates and written about Nelson and the British government (Britain against Napoleon), and became convinced that Britain came very close to being defeated by Napoleonic France. If Napoleon had not thrown it all away by his invasion of Russia in 1812, I might be writing this in French, with a very different script!
This is a fine new study looking at the lasting impact of the wars from 1815, particularly at the tens of thousands of men who had served in the army and navy.
Although Britain was in much better shape than the Continental economies, more than twenty years of warfare had changed life and industry, and there were few jobs for the returning soldiers and seamen. It led to domestic protest and violence on the streets, sometimes with veterans fighting regular troops and militia. You could not get further from the glossy fiction of C.S. Forester and Patrick O'Brian.
Few battles in world history provide a cleaner dividing line than Waterloo: before, there was Napoleon; after, there was the Pax Britannica. While Waterloo marked France's defeat and Britain's ascendance as an imperial power, the war was far from over for many soldiers and sailors, who were forced to contend with the lasting effects of battlefield trauma, the realities of an impossibly tight labour market, and growing social unrest. The Horrible Peace details a story of distress and discontent, of victory complicated by volcanism, and of the challenges facing Britain at the beginning of its victorious century.
My passion for this topic is my background as a military wife, daughter, sister, niece, and mother of men and women who served. I'm also a descendant of men who fought in the American Revolution and women who remained strong on the home front. Moving around the country as a military wife and mother gave me an inside understanding of some of the hardships and difficulties faced by women throughout American history. It’s important to share how women helped shaped this country and supported the military men and women who fought for the freedoms we have and need to continue to preserve. I've been weaving in historical stories into my current devotional series and articles.
These heartfelt prayers for the military loved ones who serve and the reader provides a faith connection and hope for those at home. It also helps the member serving to know they someone at home cares and prays for them. As a mother of a son who served, Edie wrote these first for herself and then shared them for readers who also have a family member serving. Her authenticity in the prayers reveals the emotions of one who knows she has someone in harm’s way and also shares the joy of their homecoming from each tour. I met Edie after one of her sons served and see her great compassion for those who have a friend or family member currently serving.
With over 2.3 million active and reserve military personnel, there are many families who are waiting at home and praying for their well being. While My Soldier Serves Hardcover Journal is the perfect place to record your thoughtful prayers and meditations. Whether you are praying for the needs of your soldier such as for wisdom, faith, and protection, or for the challenges you face on the homefront, including fear, loneliness, and patience, these lightly lined pages with inspirational quotes throughout invite and encourage you to keep your soldier close to your heart.
Professor Elie Wiesel was instrumental in my translating and researching my mother’s journals. My awakening to the dark period in the chapter of the Jewish history happened between 1971-1974 at CCNY, when our paths crossed while I was taking his classes at the department of Jewish studies. It was in his classes that the things that bewildered me as a child growing up in communist Poland in the shadows of the Holocaust aftermath started to make sense. I asked my mother to commit to paper the painful memories, she buried deep inside her. She and the next generations have an obligation to bear witness, to be this history's keepers.
Remembering the heroes, Witold Pilecki got himself arrested. After two and half years as a prisoner in Auschwitz, he escaped. He witnessed the brutality, the mass gassing of Europe’s Jews, thousands each day. He was among the first to set off the alarms that Auschwitz was the epicenter of the Nazis' plan to exterminate Europe’s Jews.
COSTA BOOK AWARD WINNER: BOOK OF THE YEAR • #1 SUNDAY TIMES (UK) BESTSELLER
“Superbly written and breathtakingly researched, The Volunteer smuggles us into Auschwitz and shows us—as if watching a movie—the story of a Polish agent who infiltrated the infamous camp, organized a rebellion, and then snuck back out. ... Fairweather has dug up a story of incalculable value and delivered it to us in the most compelling prose I have read in a long time.” —Sebastian Junger, author of The Perfect Storm and Tribe
The incredible true story of a Polish resistance fighter’s infiltration of Auschwitz to sabotage…
I served for seven years in the Irish Reserve Defence Forces, finishing as a weapons specialist in the infantry. I’m very grateful for the time I served in uniform and the lifelong lessons I learned that have helped me in my personal and professional life. Being a lifelong fan of military science fiction, I wrote Big Red from the point of view of a young Irish soldier thrown into a genocidal war on Mars. I’m a co-founder of the British and Irish Writing Community and our online magazine Bard of the Isles.
Ireland is known as the land of a thousand welcomes, but most people aren’t aware of its sixty unbroken years of Peacekeeping duty with the UN and even less know of its elite special forces unit known as the Army Ranger Wing (ARW).
The ARW is seen by many as one of the most effective special forces in operation. Shadow Warriors gives an in depth look into the history of the ARW, set up against the backdrop of rising instances of international terrorism and its deployment in a variety of roles across dozens of countries. This is an easy and straightforward read for anyone interested in military related books.
In the spring of 1980, the Irish Department of Defence sanctioned the establishment of a new unit within the Irish Defence Forces and the Irish Army Ranger Wing (ARW) came into being. In the decades that followed, its soldiers have been deployed on active service at home and abroad, generally without the knowledge of the wider public. The ARW is made up of seasoned men from across the island, who are selected through tough competition. Only the best of the best make it through and are trained in an extraordinary range of specialist skills. Being one of these elite operators…
