I’ve written two books on the topic of the Battle of the Bulge and countless articles. These are my favorite books on the subject and three of the five books are cited in my own monographs. (Schrijvers wrote his book after I published mine and Kershaw’s work was only tangential to my subject matter).
I wrote...
Patton at the Battle of the Bulge: How the General's Tanks Turned the Tide at Bastogne
In Patton at the Battle of the Bulge, Army veteran and historian Leo Barron explores one of the most famous yet little-told clashes of WWII, a vitally important chapter in one of history's most legendary battles.
December 1944. For the besieged American defenders of Bastogne, time was running out. Hitler's forces had pressed in on the small Belgian town in a desperate offensive designed to push back the Allies. The U.S. soldiers had managed to repel repeated attacks, but as their ammunition dwindled, the weary paratroopers of the 101st Airborne could only hope for a miracle.
MacDonald’s Time for Trumpets was one of the first books I read about the Battle of the Bulge, and it is still one of my favorites. His narrative style is easy to read and almost immediately, you find yourself, shivering in a foxhole, somewhere in the Ardennes, and staring into the morning mist, wondering where the German invaders are. His descriptions of combat are compelling and riveting, and MacDonald’s work does not skip over any major portion of the massive battle that involved a quarter of a million men on both sides. If you have to read one book on the topic of the Battle of the Bulge, this would be the one.
On December 16, 1944, the vanguard of three German armies, totaling half a million men, attacked U.S. forces in the Ardennes region of Belgium and Luxembourg, achieveing what had been considered impossible -- total surprise. In the most abysmal failure of battlefield intelligence in the history of the U.S. Army, 600,000 American soldiers found themselves facing Hitler's last desperate effort of the war.
The brutal confrontation that ensued became known as the Battle of the Bulge, the greatest battle ever fought by the U.S. Army -- a triumph of American ingenuity and dedication over an egregious failure in strategic intelligence.…
Compared to Macdonald’s tome, Toland’s book is a far more succinct account of the Battle of the Bulge (If you could call 444 pages succinct!). Toland doesn’t spend a lot of time on exposition. He dives right into the battle after the first twenty pages, which is refreshing because too many authors and historians spend too much time, writing about the build-up before the battle. Before you know it, you’re already halfway through the book and it’s only December 16. Toland avoids that pitfall. His prose is simple and straightforward. If you can’t read a 900-page book about the Bulge, then read Toland’s account.
The perspective of 15 years, painstaking research, thousands of interviews, extensive analysis and evaluation, and the creative talent of John Toland [paint] the epic struggle on an immense canvas
Unlike Toland’s and MacDonald’s monographs, Schrijvers concentrates his narrative on only a portion of the Battle of the Bulge – the Siege of Bastogne. As a result, he can delve into far greater detail than the other books. In Schrijvers’s book, we read about the individual soldiers and paratroopers who fought the Germans to a standstill and held the vital crossroads town against the odds. In addition, we learn about the civilians who also played a part in the battle for Bastogne. Lastly, the author gives the Germans a voice, too, and you begin to understand what motivated the average German Landser to continue to fight for a cause that was lost. If you enjoyed my books, No Silent Night and Patton at the Battle of the Bulge and you want to know more about Bastogne, this is a good place to start.
A new telling of the brutal siege of Bastogne, where vastly outnumbered American forces held off a savage German onslaught and sealed the fate of the Third Reich
Hitler's last gamble, the Battle of the Bulge, was intended to push the Allied invaders of Normandy all the way back to the beaches. The plan nearly succeeded, and almost certainly would have, were it not for one small Belgian town and its tenacious American defenders who held back a tenfold larger German force while awaiting the arrival of General George Patton's mighty Third Army.
If stories of divisions and corps advancing and retreating over battlefields don’t pique your interest, then this book will. Kershaw’s tale of a single reconnaissance platoon under the command of a fresh-faced 1st Lieutenant Lyle Bouck as it fights for its life and delays an entire German kampfgruppe for several crucial hours is the stuff of legend. The platoon’s sacrifice contributed significantly to the eventual defeat of the 6th SS Panzer Army, whose mission was to seize Antwerp. Thanks to Bouck and his understrength platoon, that didn’t happen. I wonder why Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg have not made this gripping human interest story into a blockbuster movie. Kershaw’s story, though, doesn’t end with the battle of Lanzerath. He follows the service members as they struggle to survive as prisoners-of-war in various German Stalags, scattered throughout the Reich. If you want to read a story about the personal experiences of soldiers trying to survive the Bulge and the War, this is the story for you.
On the morning of December 16, 1944, eighteen men of the Intelligence and Reconnaissance platoon attached to the 99th Infantry Division found themselves directly in the path of the main thrust of Hitler's massive Ardennes offensive. Despite being vastly outnumbered, they were told to hold their position "at all costs." Throughout the day, the platoon repulsed three large German assaults in a fierce day-long battle, killing hundreds of German soldiers. Only when they had run out of ammunition did they surrender to the enemy. But their long winter was just beginning. As POWs, the platoon experienced an ordeal far worse…
McManus’ book inspired me to write No Silent Night almost as a sequel to his book. Originally, I wanted to write about the entire eleven-day period from December 16 to December 26, 1944 when Patton’s Third Army lifted the siege of Bastogne. McManus’ work covers the initial period of the battle (December 16 to December 21) when the Germans finished their encirclement of Bastogne. His monograph highlights the engagements between the American 28th Infantry Division and the entire German XXXXVII Panzer Corps. It’s a David-versus-Goliath story as American infantry platoons face off against entire German battalions. Thanks to the sacrifice of units like the 110th Infantry Regiment, which ceased to exist after the first 48-hours of the campaign, the 101st Airborne won the race to Bastogne, and the rest is history.
At last, here is a book that tells the full story of the turning point in World War II’s Battle of the Bulge—the story of five crucial days in which small groups of American soldiers, some outnumbered ten to one, slowed the German advance and allowed the Belgian town of Bastogne to be reinforced. Alamo in the Ardennes provides a compelling, day-by-day account of this pivotal moment in America's greatest war.
My life and work have been profoundly affected by the central circumstance of my existence: I was born into a very large military Catholic family in the United States of America. As a child surrounded by many others in the 60s, I wrote, performed, and directed family plays with my numerous brothers and sisters. Although I fell in love with a Canadian and moved to Canada, my family of origin still exerts considerable personal influence. My central struggle, coming from that place of chaos, order, and conformity, is to have the courage to live an authentic life based on my own experience of connectedness and individuality, to speak and be heard.
Trapped in her enormous, devout Catholic family in 1963, Annie creates a hilarious campaign of lies when the pope dies and their family friend, Cardinal Stefanucci, is unexpectedly on the shortlist to be elected the first American pope.
Driven to elevate her family to the holiest of holy rollers in the parish, Annie is tortured by her own dishonesty. But when “The Hands” visits her in her bed and when her sister finds herself facing a scandal, Annie discovers her parents will do almost anything to uphold their reputation and keep their secrets safe.
Questioning all she has believed and torn between her own gut instinct and years of Catholic guilt, Annie takes courageous risks to wrest salvation from the tragic sequence of events set in motion by her parents’ betrayal.
