Fans pick 100 books like The Bloody Game

By Paul Fussell (editor),

Here are 100 books that The Bloody Game fans have personally recommended if you like The Bloody Game. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of On War

Martin Van Creveld Author Of The Privileged Sex

From my list on on war, full stop.

Why am I passionate about this?

As a professor emeritus of history at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, over the years I’ve been widely mentioned as one of the world’s foremost experts on military theory and history. On these and other topics I have written 34 books, which between them have been published in 19 languages. I’ve also consulted with defense departments, taught and lectured all over the world, etc., etc.

Martin's book list on on war, full stop

Martin Van Creveld Why did Martin love this book?

Most theoretical works on war claim to instruct their readers about how to wage war. With the result that, especially in modern times when technology is racing ahead, quickly becomes out of date. By contrast, Clausewitz, a student of the philosopher Immanuel Kant, all but ignores technology. Instead he focuses on two cardinal questions: what war is, and what it is waged for. From this, using reality to check on theory and theory to check on reality, he proceeds step by step. Many of his conclusions, e.g “war is a duel on an extended scale means.” “The best strategy is always to be very strong, first in general and then at the decisive point.” “The attacker always wants peace.” “The stronger form of war is the defense.” “In war everything is simple, but the simplest thing is very complex.” “Comes the culminating point, every offense will turn into a defense,”…

By Carl von Clausewitz, Beatrice Heuser, Michael Howard (translator) , Peter Paret (translator)

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked On War as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'War is merely the continuation of policy by other means'

On War is one of the most important books ever written on the subject of war. Clausewitz, a Prussian officer who fought against the French during the Napoleonic Wars, sought to understand and analyse the phenomenon of war so that future leaders could conduct and win conflicts more effectively. He studied the human and social factors that affect outcomes, as well as the tactical and technological ones. He understood that war was a weapon of government, and that political purpose,
chance, and enmity combine to shape its dynamics. On War…


Book cover of War in Human Civilization

Wayne E. Lee Author Of The Cutting-Off Way: Indigenous Warfare in Eastern North America, 1500-1800

From my list on war beyond the state.

Why am I passionate about this?

I've been writing about and teaching military history for many years (I'm a professor at the University of North Carolina), mostly focused on the pre-industrial world, and mostly about the maelstrom of the North Atlantic colonial experience (including warfare in Ireland, England, and in North America). I quickly decided that I needed to do more to understand the Native American perspective, and that also meant understanding the very nature of their societies: Not just how they fought, but how they imagined the function of war. This book is the product of constantly returning to that problem, while also putting it into a world comparative context of other non-state experiences of war. 

Wayne's book list on war beyond the state

Wayne E. Lee Why did Wayne love this book?

I teach this book to my graduate students every year.

It is a wide-ranging, deeply researched attempt to understand the nature of war in the human experience. And unlike so many other surveys of military history, Gat goes all the way back to human evolution and the fundamental motives underlying human conflict. He also then shows how conflict itself shaped human cultural evolution and the rise of states. 

By Azar Gat,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked War in Human Civilization as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Why do people go to war? Is it rooted in human nature or is it a late cultural invention? How does war relate to the other fundamental developments in the history of human civilization? And what of war today - is it a declining phenomenon or simply changing its shape?

In this truly global study of war and civilization, Azar Gat sets out to find definitive answers to these questions in an attempt to unravel the 'riddle of war' throughout human history, from the early hunter-gatherers right through to the unconventional terrorism of the twenty-first century.

In the process, the…


Book cover of Perilous Glory: The Rise of Western Military Power

Beatrice Heuser Author Of War: A Genealogy of Western Ideas and Practices

From my list on war in general.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have studied aspects of war and strategy – mainly on the political-military interface level – for the past forty years of my life. My interest originated from my parents’ stories about their childhood and early youth in the Second World Wars, its horrors and hardships, and from myself living in South-East Asia during the time of the Vietnam War. Moreover, I became obsessed with the fear of nuclear war through reading and hearing about it. So I have studied aspects of war, much as an oncologist studies cancer, in the hope that a better understanding may eventually help us ban it in practice (and not just in theory as it has been since the Briand-Kellogg Pact of 1928).

Beatrice's book list on war in general

Beatrice Heuser Why did Beatrice love this book?

John France has a knack for making the history of war interesting and readable, without taking away its gore and horror, without making you think it in any way romantic or desirable. The title already captures it: the book is largely about the rise of Europe (or later: the West) on the back of military prowess, but at what perilous price! The book aptly traces military traditions and continuity of ideas and concepts, but also profound changes, from Antiquity to the present, giving us a grasp of the essence of warfare during different periods. This book can be said to replace Sir Charles Oman’s old classic.

By John France,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Perilous Glory as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A major new history of war that challenges our understanding of military dominance and how it is achieved

This expansive book surveys the history of warfare from ancient Mesopotamia to the Gulf War in search of a deeper understanding of the origins of Western warfare and the reasons for its eminence today. Historian John France explores the experience of war around the globe, in Europe, Asia, Africa, and America. His bold conclusions cast doubt on well-entrenched attitudes about the development of military strength, the impact of culture on warfare, the future of Western dominance, and much more.

Taking into account…


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Book cover of American Flygirl

American Flygirl By Susan Tate Ankeny,

The first and only full-length biography of Hazel Ying Lee, an unrecognized pioneer and unsung World War II hero who fought for a country that actively discriminated against her gender, race, and ambition.

This unique hidden figure defied countless stereotypes to become the first Asian American woman in United States…

Book cover of Winning Wars: The Enduring Nature and Changing Character of Victory from Antiquity to the 21st Century

Beatrice Heuser Author Of War: A Genealogy of Western Ideas and Practices

From my list on war in general.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have studied aspects of war and strategy – mainly on the political-military interface level – for the past forty years of my life. My interest originated from my parents’ stories about their childhood and early youth in the Second World Wars, its horrors and hardships, and from myself living in South-East Asia during the time of the Vietnam War. Moreover, I became obsessed with the fear of nuclear war through reading and hearing about it. So I have studied aspects of war, much as an oncologist studies cancer, in the hope that a better understanding may eventually help us ban it in practice (and not just in theory as it has been since the Briand-Kellogg Pact of 1928).

Beatrice's book list on war in general

Beatrice Heuser Why did Beatrice love this book?

This book begins with our inherited views of what constitutes victory – the proudly-displayed Greek panoply of captured weapons, the Roman triumph, the medieval view of battle as awesome divine judgment, and the modern quest for “decisive battle” in mind. By contrast, other cultures – Iran, Assad’s Syria, China, and Russia for example, which are covered brilliantly – may be content with indecisive, drawn-out conflicts which give them the chance to keep their fingers in many pies and incrementally increase their influence. 

Thus our modern Western construct assuming that peace is the norm and war the exception, or that war should aim for a neat victory, and a lasting peace settlement imposed on the defeated adversary, is just that: a construct, rarely reflecting views and practices in other times and in other parts of the world. 

By Matthias Strohn,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Winning Wars as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

While 'winning' might be considered a fundamental part of the human objective, what constitutes winning and how one might achieve it remain somewhat abstract, in war as in any other human endeavour. 'Winning' militarily at the tactical level - in a firefight or a battle - has always been more quantifiable than at the strategic level. At the strategic level, success might be measured by means of three big ideas: ownership; intervention for effect; and fighting for ideas. The divergence between success at the tactical level and the political context of the war creates a challenge at the operational level…


Book cover of Stone in a Landslide

Jacqueline Yallop Author Of Obedience: A Novel

From my list on brilliant old women as heroines.

Why am I passionate about this?

Sister Bernard, the main character in my novel Obedience, is ninety. I’ve always been fascinated – and afraid – of what it means to grow old, particularly as a woman, and I like exploring the perspectives that age can bring. I enjoy seeing older women given a voice, especially when they don’t turn out to be the easy, likeable characters we might expect. There aren’t that many books with really old women as the main characters, because age is not glamorous or comfortable, but that’s why it’s interesting. I hope the novels on this list go some way towards redressing the balance. 

Jacqueline's book list on brilliant old women as heroines

Jacqueline Yallop Why did Jacqueline love this book?

In this short beautiful novel, Conxa looks back on a life blasted apart by the Spanish Civil War. The Pyrenean setting of the story is as magnificent and brutal as the action here, but what I love most is the calm, timeless voice of Conxa as she tells her story of love and war and family. This is a brilliant book about what it means to live a long life and the lingering effects of the past.

By Maria Barbal,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Stone in a Landslide as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The beginning of the 20th century: 13-year-old Conxa has to leave her home village in the Pyrenees to work for her childless aunt. After years of hard labour, she finds love with Jaume - a love that will be thwarted by the Spanish Civil War. Approaching her own death, Conxa looks back on a life in which she has lost everything except her own indomitable spirit. ------- Why Peirene chose to publish this book: 'I fell in love with Conxa's narrative voice, its stoic calmness and the complete lack of anger and bitterness. It's a timeless voice, down to earth…


Book cover of Bitter Seeds

J.L. Gribble Author Of Steel Victory

From my list on blending fantasy and alternate history.

Why am I passionate about this?

With a graduate degree in Writing Popular Fiction (seriously, someone gave me a degree for writing an urban fantasy book), I know that genres are nothing more than marketing terms that tell bookstores which shelves to put the books on. As an author, combining genres and subverting their topes allows me to stretch their potential and tell fresh stories that might not find an easy home on a single shelf, so it’s also important for me to read and support those making the same attempts. Stories that adhere to strict reader expectations will always find a home, but I’ve always had way more fun exploring the other possibilities.

J.L.'s book list on blending fantasy and alternate history

J.L. Gribble Why did J.L. love this book?

I did my best to put together a list of alternate history books that didn’t feature either the American Civil War or World War 2, but this book was too interesting to leave out (and also, it doesn’t involve the Nazis winning the war in yet another veiled attempt at white supremacism fanfic). It does fit within my list in how Tregillis also flips many of the tropes of the genres explored here, especially regarding the main character’s role within the plot. And lest you think all alternate history stories with a healthy dose of fantasy must feature a romantic element, Tregillis’ unflinching take on the horrors of war (but add magic and make it equally horrifying) should more than make up for it.

By Ian Tregillis,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Bitter Seeds as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Raybould Marsh is a British secret agent in the early days of the Second World War, haunted by something strange he saw on a mission during the Spanish Civil War: a German woman with wires going into her head who looked at him as if she knew him. When the Nazis start running missions with people who have unnatural abilities - a woman who can turn invisible, a man who can walk through walls, and the woman Marsh saw in Spain who can use her knowledge of the future to twist the present - Marsh is the man who has…


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Book cover of The Lion and the Fox: Two Rival Spies and the Secret Plot to Build a Confederate Navy

The Lion and the Fox By Alexander Rose,

From the author of Washington’s Spies, the thrilling story of two rival secret agents — one Confederate, the other Union — sent to Britain during the Civil War.

The South’s James Bulloch, charming and devious, was ordered to acquire a clandestine fleet intended to break Lincoln’s blockade, sink Northern…

Book cover of Objectivity and Liberal Scholarship

Martha A. Ackelsberg Author Of Free Women of Spain: Anarchism and the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women

From my list on anarchism and revolution in the Spanish Civil War.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been studying and writing about, anarchism, gender, and the Spanish Civil War for almost 4 decades. I first explored what it would mean to organize a society without formal institutions of authority; and, as part of that research, I looked at how anarcho-syndicalist organizations related to governmental institutions and the struggle against fascism in Spain. I then engaged in a multi-year investigation of the social revolution that occurred in the midst of the ensuing Civil War and, in particular, the activities of the anarchist women’s organization, Mujeres Libres. Through the research for my book, Free Women of Spain: Anarchism and the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women, I was captivated by the extraordinary strength and enthusiasm of those women, and committed myself to telling their stories in ways that would be relevant to contemporary readers.

Martha's book list on anarchism and revolution in the Spanish Civil War

Martha A. Ackelsberg Why did Martha love this book?

This is a now-classic essay that explores the ways mainstream news media (and subsequent academic studies) downplayed and/or misrepresented the revolutionary nature of the Spanish Civil War. Although the war began as a result of a failed military coup d’etat against a legally-elected republican government, it came to be seen simply as a battle between communists (identified with the government) and supporters of order (who were actually the fascist rebels!). Drawing parallels with the ways U.S. media represented the revolutionary forces in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, Chomsky makes clear just how significant that misrepresentation became—not just at the time, but in the continuing historiography of the Spanish Civil War.

By Noam Chomsky,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Objectivity and Liberal Scholarship as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Objectivity and Liberal Scholarship is Chomsky's powerful indictment of a liberal intelligentsia that provided self-serving arguments for war in Vietnam, legitimizing U.S. commitment to autocratic rule, to intervention in Asia and, ultimately, the "pacification" of millions. Over thirty years after their first printing, these are prophetic words, as today America effects "regime change" in Iraq and an increasingly boisterous militarism around the globe. Included here is Chomsky's classic counter-analysis of the Spanish Civil War as a revolutionary war from below, as he lays bare the hostility of even liberal scholarly elites to engage in mass movements and social change, revealing…


Book cover of Defying Male Civilization: Women in the Spanish Civil War

Martha A. Ackelsberg Author Of Free Women of Spain: Anarchism and the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women

From my list on anarchism and revolution in the Spanish Civil War.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have been studying and writing about, anarchism, gender, and the Spanish Civil War for almost 4 decades. I first explored what it would mean to organize a society without formal institutions of authority; and, as part of that research, I looked at how anarcho-syndicalist organizations related to governmental institutions and the struggle against fascism in Spain. I then engaged in a multi-year investigation of the social revolution that occurred in the midst of the ensuing Civil War and, in particular, the activities of the anarchist women’s organization, Mujeres Libres. Through the research for my book, Free Women of Spain: Anarchism and the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women, I was captivated by the extraordinary strength and enthusiasm of those women, and committed myself to telling their stories in ways that would be relevant to contemporary readers.

Martha's book list on anarchism and revolution in the Spanish Civil War

Martha A. Ackelsberg Why did Martha love this book?

Mary Nash is the “dean” of women’s history in Spain, who has done excellent work on the history of working-class Spanish women, birth control, anarchism, and much more. This book, her only major work published in English, places the roles of women—and the revolutionary activities of Mujeres Libres—into its broader historical context. Importantly, she looks not only at the activities of left-wing and revolutionary women, but at how the fascist counter-revolution affected women and families in the years that followed the war.

By Mary Nash,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Defying Male Civilization as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Book by Nash, Mary


Book cover of The Spanish Holocaust: Inquisition and Extermination in Twentieth-Century Spain

Steven Nightingale Author Of Granada: A Pomegranate in the Hand of God

From my list on the truth about Spanish history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a writer who lived in the city of Granada for almost four years, in the uncanny barrio of the Albayzin. The daily blessings of life there are powerful and cumulative, and I wrote a book in honor of such luminosity; and I wrote it, as well, because most of us have been lied to about Spanish history. But the truth, like the poetry of Garcia Lorca, cannot be suppressed. In my sojourn in Spain, and in my visits over the years, I have found Granada to be a treasure-house of stories and poetry; and in flamenco singing, the home of one of the most powerful art-forms of music in the world.

Steven's book list on the truth about Spanish history

Steven Nightingale Why did Steven love this book?

The whole of Spanish history is contentious, with hardly a fact not subject to challenge or attack. But slowly, clarity and understanding have come forth, and finally, in this volume, the extraordinary scholar Paul Preston gives us the facts about the campaigns of extermination in the Spanish Civil War. Anyone who wants a solid, grounded, informed understanding of this miserable time of slaughter needs this book. Painful reading, and all the more necessary for that.

By Paul Preston,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Spanish Holocaust as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Evoking such classics as Anne Applebaum's Gulag and Robert Conquest's The Great Terror, The Spanish Holocaust sheds light on one of the darkest and most unexamined eras of modern European history. As Spain finally reclaims its historical memory, a full picture can now be drawn of the atrocities of Franco's Spain-from torture and judicial murders to the abuse of women and children. Paul Preston provides an unforgettable account of the systematic terror carried out by Spain's fascist government.


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Book cover of Aggressor

Aggressor By FX Holden,

It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan. The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced, it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run the…

Book cover of The Shadow of the Wind

Mark Stibbe Author Of A Book in Time

From my list on the magic of books, bookshops, and libraries.

Why am I passionate about this?

When I was a boy, my adoptive father – a star pupil and friend of C.S. Lewis – heard I’d started reading the Sherlock Holmes stories. He bought every Sherlock Holmes book he could find. I remember lifting one to my nose and smelling the pages. I fell in love with books that day. I went on to earn a senior scholarship in English Literature at Cambridge University, and a PhD in storytelling. Since then, I have written over 50 books of my own and ghostwritten over 30 titles. I now host The Christian Storyteller Channel on YouTube, and I run BookLab, dedicated to helping emerging authors. My whole life is books.

Mark's book list on the magic of books, bookshops, and libraries

Mark Stibbe Why did Mark love this book?

I love the idea that books have souls, and I adore this quotation from Zafon’s classic novel: “Every book, every volume you see here, has a soul. The soul of the person who wrote it and of those who read it and lived and dreamed with it.”

I was thrilled to find this novel after I’d written my book because it shows that there are others who sense the soulful quality of old books. I also love it because it is written by a Spanish novelist, and it is in the Spanish-speaking world that we find the true literary origins of my most-loved genre of writing – magical realism.

By Carlos Ruiz Zafón, Lucia Graves (translator),

Why should I read it?

11 authors picked The Shadow of the Wind as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The New York Times bestseller

"The Shadow of the Wind is ultimately a love letter to literature, intended for readers as passionate about storytelling as its young hero." -Entertainment Weekly (Editor's Choice)

"One gorgeous read." -Stephen King

Barcelona, 1945: A city slowly heals in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, and Daniel, an antiquarian book dealer's son who mourns the loss of his mother, finds solace in a mysterious book entitled The Shadow of the Wind, by one Julian Carax. But when he sets out to find the author's other works, he makes a shocking discovery: someone has been…


Book cover of On War
Book cover of War in Human Civilization
Book cover of Perilous Glory: The Rise of Western Military Power

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