Anyone have any good WWII fiction books to recommend?

I would also love some good recommendations. But I have one on my wish list that I'm anxiously awaiting. The Rising Tide by Jeff Shaara will be released in November. I've enjoyed a couple of his books from the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, and I expect this one to be good.

It's marked as a young adult book, but I loved The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I truly think it's one of the best books I've ever read, and I would recomend it to anyone. It takes place in Germany during WW II.

Black Cross by Greg Iles.

The True Story of Hansel and Gretel, The Seige by Helen Dunmore, The Madonnas of Leningrad, YA titles Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli, Good Night Mr. Tom, and The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips..will start The Book Thiefsoon.

I recently read Mary Doria Russell's A Thread of Grace, which takes place in Italy toward the end of the war. She has a wonderful way of making her characters so real you can almost reach out and touch them, and the novel deals with an interesting and little-known episode, when the Italians (officially allied with Germany) defied the Nazis to shelter a large number of Jews, both Italian and from elsewhere, in the countryside. My only criticism is there were a few too many characters to easily keep track of; a writer of lesser skills wouldn't have been able to pull it off.

Then, of course, there is Leon Uris's classic Exodus, which deals with the aftermath.

On the off-chance that you read German, I'd highly recommend the novel Stella Termogen by Utta Danella. I haven't got it catalogued yet, but it shows what the war was like for a young German woman. The book starts a bit slowly, because it begins with Stella's birth and tells her life story through the aftermath of the war. It's a very different and interesting perspective and an absorbing novel. I don't know if it's been translated into English.

Cross of Iron by Willi Heinrich is good one written from the German perspective. The Officer Factory and The Night of the Generals are two more by Hans Hellmut Kirst set in Germany. If you somehow have missed From Here to Eternity and its sequels you will want to try them. Legion of the Damned is another Eastern front novel. Gone for Soldiers by Marge Piercy offers an American homefront story. The Singapore Grip is good one set during the invasion of Singapore.

It's been a long time since I've read it, but I really enjoyed Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi.

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne is amazing. It's not to everyone's taste, and is not really a book for adults, but it's nevertheless hugely moving.

I also enjoyed The Reader by Bernard Schlink..I think it was set at the end of the war in Germany. It has been awhile. A Woman in Berlin reads like fiction but it is non fiction...that one has stayed with me...a woman's survival in Berlin...and the Russians got there first.

I highly recommend Len Deighton's Bomber. Deighton normally writes schlock Cold War fiction, but this book is outstanding. It is about a Lancaster raid that goes off course and hits the wrong town. To write the book, the author did years of research, talking to bomber crew, ground crew, German night fighter pilots, German anti-aircraft crew and German emergency services. The characters are extremely real, and the technical information is first class.

Anita Shreve's Resistance is quite a good read - about a US bomber pilot downed in occupied France.

Seconding Goodnight Mister Tom, I'll add Carrie's War, by Nina Bawden, and The Machine Gunners by Robert Westall.

Message edited by its author, Sep 21, 2006, 1:53pm.

I love Book Thief and I also really liked Madonnas of Leningrad. I have heard a lot about The Remains of the Day, but haven't read it yet.

Not sure if it's the sort of thing you are looking for but The Man in the High Castle by Philip K Dick is a 'What if the Allies lost WWII' book. The story itself and the characters are a bit quirky. Definitely not a war novel. Takes place in a US that is half German occupied territory and half Japanese occupied territory. The plot itself revolves around a banned book which is a 'What if the Allies won WWII' book. ha

There is a really trash spy novel called They Used Dark Forces by Dennis Wheatley. It's actually a Spy/Occult novel based in WWII and is pretty bad but I found the steriotypical pulp novel aspect to be a bit entertaining personally.

Two good novels about different aspects of WWII are The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer and Empire of the Sun by J. G. Ballard.

An (very) offbeat novel set during the end of the war is Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon.

The only one that comes to mind now is The Forger by Paul Watkins. It is about an American who comes to Paris in the 1930's to study painting, and gets involved in an elaborate and dangerous scam to defraud the Nazis. I enjoyed it very much.

Ever tried Hans Helmut Kirst? I remember reading The Revolt of Gunner Asch when I was in my teens and thinking it a decent satire on the German Army.

On the darker side, try:

December 6 : A Novel and Stallion Gate by Martin Cruz Smith (of Gorky Park fame).

The Good German by Joseph Kanon is set in Potsdam immediately after the German surrender. Kanon's Los Alamos is about a murder near the end of the Manhattan Project.

The series of historical spy novels by Alan Furst put you in occupied Europe in the late 1930s and early 1940s.

While Still We Live by Helen MacInnes stands out about the German invasion of Poland set in Warsaw. Some of her more conventional novels set in WWII are good as well Above Suspicion, Assignment in Brittany and Horizon.

Message edited by its author, Sep 8, 2006, 2:31pm.

Jackdaws by Ken Follett is a very exciting read about a British women who worked as saboteurs behind enemy lines in France. It's may not be "great literature", but I found myself worrying about what would happen to the characters as I was falling asleep at night.

Jackdaws by Ken Follett is a very exciting read about a British women who worked as saboteurs behind enemy lines in France. It's may not be "great literature", but I found myself worrying about what would happen to the characters as I was falling asleep at night.

Terribly sorry, this is WWI, but such a good book I can't help myself - A long, Long Way by Sebastian Barry. No matter what I read about war I always wonder what the experience was really like. This novel seems to comes closest to describing the experience of a soldier.

Message edited by its author, Sep 11, 2006, 8:51am.

Land Girls by Angela Huth is one of my all-time favorites.

The Mercy Room by Gilles Rozier is a recent read that's beautifully written.

Herman Wouk's WWII books are very good. The Winds of War and War and Remembrance are more of a saga set against the backdrop of the war but are excellent reads. The Caine Mutiny is one of the best books I have ever read.

I second the nominations for The Book Thief and A Thread of Grace; the first because it's one of the best books I've read this year and the second because I hadn't previously been aware of the actions of Italian citizens during the war.

A book that was recently favorably reviewed in one of the local (Denver) papers was Billy Boyle: A World War II Mystery. My library doesn't even have it yet, though, so I can't tell you if it's any good.

And finally, I was surprised by how much I enjoyed Scott Turow's Ordinary Heroes.

I recently read Charlotte Gray by Sebastian Faulks and really enjoyed it. It's the story of a woman who is in love with a pilot and ends up getting sent to France as a messenger and stays to try to find him. It's a very vivid tale about the resistance and what life was like - the lack of food, fuel, and the general feeling of being caught in the middle and not knowing where your loyalties lie. I also just finished The Blue Noon by Robert Ryan which is in a similar vein. Both talk about the resistance and covert operations in France. Blue Noon is very carefully based on a true story and many characters that are mentioned are well known people Malcom Muggeridge and Anthony (Airey) Neave to mention a few. So there is a lot of history interwoven with the fiction. Both were entralling for me because I am more interested in the human side of the war rather than the political, military or philisophical side. I read to find out what the average person was experiencing during those years. My parents met during the war, and both passed away recently so I am looking for answers to some of the questions that I never thought to ask until it was too late.

I just read "The Tiger Claw" by Shauna Singh Baldwin. The novel is inspired by Noor Khan - a spy who worked again the Nazi in occupied France.
Highly recommended.

Woo Hoo, I made up a list of all the books that you guys mentioned and took it to the Second Hand bookstore today. I scored quite a few. Interestingly, all the titles that I found were in the section marked "Spy/War" - an area I would never have wandered into otherwise. But when I asked the owner where to look, that's where he sent me. Fortunately, it's one of the few sections that is sorted by Author Name so my list was in that order and I was able to whip through it in not too much time at all. If anyone wants a copy of my list either in Word format or Excel or just as a text file, just email me and I'll send you a copy. It was very helpful to have the whole list in front of me. I plan on keeping it updated as more recommendations come in, because it's an area that I will really want to do some research in. Now the decision is, which one to start on first!! I came out of there with two grocery bags full so I have plenty to choose from. Thanks for all the recommendations!!

In terms of WWII:
“The Living and the Dead" by Konstantin Simonov
"Life and Fate" by Vasily Grossman
"Young Lions" by Irwin Shaw
"The Triumph and the Glory" Steven E. Rustad (my favorite by far)
"Star" by E. Kazakevich
"Double Cross Blind" by Joel Ross
The first two are some of the best novels published about WWII from the Eastern Front perspective, the second being considered by some to have been THE best novel to come out of WWII. My person favorite, as noted, is Rustad's book which incorporats points of view from the Americans, Germans, Brits, and Soviets. The others are all worth reading at least once. "Star" was made into a movie by the Russians, both versions (somewhat different ending in the movie) are good.

I really thought "WAR A History" by Elsa Morante was
great book on how one individual survives in facist
Italy during WW11. The book is an English translation
from the original Italian.

I just picked up The Mercy Room by Gilles Rozier. Has anyone read it? Looks more like a novella.

I liked Robert Harris' Enigma a lot -- a mystery set within the ranks of the codebreakers in WWII. They made a pretty good movie out of that one too.

Harris also wrote Fatherland, which is really post-WWII speculative fiction, but also quite good.

Message edited by its author, Sep 24, 2006, 12:29pm.

Heinrich Böll, Heinrich Böll and Heinrich Böll!! Try Billiards at Half-Past Nine for a start. For a highly literary/poetic biography, there is Night by Elie Wiesel.

Curzio Malaparte's 'Kaputt' which was written during the war--Malaparte was a correspondent for the Corriere dela Sera covers much of the German campaigns into Russia and Yugoslavia. It also touches on the nazi occupation of Poland and Finnish-Soviet war. Malaparte's book is very eye opening--he was no fan of the Nazi's. It's very elegant prose masks some very disturbing scenes of carnage and depravity. It's considered as fiction but it's more fictionalized. He followed it up with a sequel 'The skin' by which time he had joined up with the American army moving northward through Italy.

James Jones--thin red line.
Lothar gunther Buchheim's--Das Boot
Currently reading Willi Heinrich's--Cross of Iron and that is very good.
Claude Simon's--Flanders Road.
W.S. Kuniczak's--thousand hour day (about the German invasion of Poland from a Polish perspective) and there's a sequel to that 'The March'.
Could throw in Louis Ferdinand Celine's trilogy of novels--Castle to Castle, North, Rigodoon--which are all highly objective but it does give a number of interesting and usually very humorously blackened portraits of many of the more prominent French Vichy figures.
Mailer's--Naked and the Dead as someone mentioned and also have read one of Furst's novels (also mentioned above) but it was very good.
Almost forgot Paul West's--Very rich hours of Count Von Stauffenberg--which details very horrifically the plot of German Officers to assassinate Hitler--and that is a really disturbing book.

Message edited by its author, Oct 19, 2006, 5:45pm.

I've been reading (very slowly as there's a lot of skipping back and forth between characters as their lives slowly converge) Gone to Soldiers by Marge Piercy and chanced upon a copy of A Woman in Berlin which I'm itching to read. I just have so many books in my "to be read" pile right now after taking the list compiled from the recommendations of everyone here to the second hand bookstore. I'm trying not to start a different book until I've finished the one I'm on, but Gone to Soldiers takes a bit more concentration than I realized when I began. It starts out like several different stories but then you realize that peripheral characters in each story appear in another and then you see how they are all linked together. I ended up going back and skimming sections I'd already read for bits I missed the first time through. But so far it's very good. I'll post my final opinion when I'm done.

Also for WWII, there is The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro, Atonement, by Ian McEwan, Memoirs of a Geisha (kind of), Five Quarters of the Orange. And, of course, Night.

Finished Gone to Soldiers by Marge Piercy. I enjoyed it, but it got much darker than I expected, based on the way it began. Also, the ending kind of left me feeling that the book could have had a few more chapters. I don't know why, but it felt like each character's story was so unfinished. Of course probably because they were unfinished. But usually novels at least make you feel like you haven't lost the last 100 pages or so. But I got what I wanted from it, which was a description of what the average person _might_ have been through during the war. This book covered a lot of area since it was both North America, Europe and the Eastern Front. The war against Japan was a part of the war that I'd never read much about but now am interested. Sounded like a horrendous place to have served. Now I understand the bias so many of my parent's contemporaries had against Japanese cars when they first came on the market. And I was made aware that once the Jewish survivors were freed from the camps, many still were not citizens of any country. Their battles were far from over once they'd survived.
Anyway, I'd recommend it, but allow yourself plenty of time to keep all the different plots organized in your head.

I definitely agree with the Heinrich Böll recommendation! I've never come across a book by him that I didn't like.
It's a graphic novel, but I love Art Spiegelman's Maus. The Dark Room by Rachel Seiffert is also interesting. It doesn't take place strictly during WWII, but is about it. There are 3 sections - one in the 1930s, one during the war, and one in the 1990s. I also really liked Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky (WWII France), and The Night Watch by Sarah Waters (WWII London).

I don't often make statements like this but here we go - Everyone MUST read A Woman in Berlin. It's an easy, fast read but you will feel sick at the end of it. It packs a powerful message about what things were like for women during the war. I expect this behavior happened wherever the front line soldiers (of any army) went and there were women and liquor. The hopelessness and fear and powerlessness of these people is heartrending. And they are also finding out for the first time about the death camps and what their countrymen did with all the Jews and prisoners. Very enlightening and everyone interested in WWII needs to read this. I can't think of how many women in how many countries were overrun like this. I know Estonia took a hard hit between the Germans and the Russians the power went back and forth. I'm sure loyalties went to those that used the least brutality for all of them behaved brutally toward their captives. Oh what an evil world we live in sometimes. It never ceases to shock me. But maybe I look for the best in everyone and don't usually think badly of any group. So the behavior described in this book really shocked me more than anything.

Another one, that I'm reading now, is Thomas Mann's Faustus. The Faust story seems one of the perfect classics for Germany's greatest 20th century writer to be retelling during the war.

Message edited by its author, Oct 7, 2006, 5:15pm.

Dear derblitz109,

A stunning semi-fictional WWII book is Kaputt by Curzio Malaparte. It's really top of the bill, and I can tell, for I have read numerous books on this subject.

BELAQUA

Amen warbrideslass...A Woman in Berlin is a haunting look at war through the eyes of a woman who could be me.

warbrideslass - After your recommendation of A Woman in Berlin, I put it on hold - I'm picking it up today.

Re: Quartzite's recommendation of Helen MacInnes. Really enjoyed her books and if I were to reread one it would probably be While Still We Live.

Another author who wrote in the years following 1945 (and drawing heavily on his own experiences for some) was Nevil Shute. Three that really stand out for me are The Legacy aka A Town Like Alice, Pied Piper, and the Chequer Board. The Legacy deals, in its first half, with some women who were prisoners of the Japanese in Malaya and is based on an actual incident. Pied Piper is set in France in the summer of 1940 and concerns an elderly Englishman trying to get home along with some children he agreed to take with him.

A more recent book is Sentimental Journey by Jill Barnett. While Ms. Barnett is primarily known for her romances, this book was written to honor her father and to try to tell about the men and women who lived through his time and fought his war. In reading it I felt more connected to my parents' generation. While the characters fall in love as well as fight a war, Sentimental Journey is primarily about the characters getting on with their jobs and surviving as best they can.

I started reading Billy Boyle, A World War II Mystery, by James R. Benn. The author's voice is intreguing and the story is interesting. Based on the first few chapters I recommend it.

“Once an Eagle” is one of the very best novels I’ve ever read. It covers much of the 20th century and describes the “coming-of-age” of a young man who begins his military career in WW I and concludes it in Vietnam. Meyer explores important questions of honor and integrity in the military in war and peace.

I will list several more novels below that I have read and enjoyed, as well as a couple of non-fiction books.

“Piece of Cake” by Derek Robinson describes the air war in the early years of WW II. The novel follows a group of RAF pilots during the “Phony War” in France, the evacuation from France, and the Battle of Britain. It explores how individuals cope with the terror of combat.

“Bomber” by Len Deighton describes one day in the Battle of the Ruhr from the perspective of a RAF bomber crew, a German fighter pilot, and a German officer charged with antiaircraft defenses of the Ruhr. This description brings the battle down to a struggle between individuals rather than between faceless enemies.

“The Magic Army” by Leslie Thomas tells the story of the buildup of US forces in England between January and June of 1944. Much of the story turns on the displacement of Brits from farms and villages to make way for the Yanks – and the attitudes spawned on both sides by this American invasion.

In the category of non-fiction I suggest several memoirs that read almost like novels:

“With the Old Breed” by E. B. Sledge describes the author’s experiences as a marine in some of the tough island battles of the Pacific through the battle of Okinawa.

“Goodbye, Darkness” is the personal experiences of a great story teller, William Manchester, as a Marine rifleman. It is one man’s attempt to understand the meaning of war.

“The Brereton Diaries” follow Lewis Brereton’s experiences from the fall of the Philippines through the defense of Australia to the building of an American combat force in India, American assistance to the Brits in the defense of Egypt, and, finally, Overlord. Hard to believe that one man could be in so many critical areas during one war, but Brereton was there.

Finally, “Reach for the Sky” by Paul Brickhill is the memoir of Douglas Bader, a RAF pilot who lost both of his legs in an aircraft crash in the late 1930’s, yet went on to fly and fight in the Battle of Britain. Inspiring.

Message edited by its author, Oct 18, 2006, 5:00pm.

hailelib,
I think your last paragraph summs up what I am trying to do in my reading and that is to "feel more connected to my parents' war". Both my parents died in the beginning of this year and they would have been married 61 years on May 10 which was the day of my Dad's funeral. He had said just after my mom died that it would be the first year they wouldn't be together on their anniversary. They ended up together anyway. They married just a few days after the war ended, so their wedding was pretty low scale. I read on a war brides list recently where Barbara Cartland gathered as many wedding dresses as she could and let them out for 1 pound a day so that war brides could have a wedding gown. My Mom got married in a suit but I know a few years later, my aunt was getting married and rationing was still so strict that she had to get a wedding gown sent from Canada. My mom sent it to her and she was thrilled to have it as so many brides still could not buy silk or nylon(which was the closest synthetic to silk at the time) clothing. Those were the most common fabrics used for bridal gowns.

I like this thread; the specificity of it! "Historical fiction" is so vast - covering...well...all of history, right? I would recommend if anyone has a specific time period they enjoy and would like recommendations, they start a new topic...

The list for WWII is really endless..from Herman Wouk,'s Winds of War, Caine MutinyPierre Boulle's The Bridge Over the River Kwai and one of my favs...The Dirty Dozen which my parents took away from me (inappropriate for young girls, but I finished it the next time they went grocery shopping) to Martin Booth's Hiroshima Joe and Angela Huth's Land Girls to Sarah Waters' Night Watch. I think the best WWII books I've read in the last couple of years are Thread of Grace and Night Watch. Mary Doria Russell will tell you that she used some of Rumsfeld's words in that book...guess for which character?

I just finished one that was really interesting, but not truely historical, Days of Infamy by Harry Turtledove. It's alternate history of WWII touching on what would have happened to Hawaii if Japan had actually invaded. It certainly puts a new twist on the history of Pearl Harbor, by having Americans subjugated by the Japanese.

One of my favourites is an unusual one focusing on a group of children on the outskirts of London during the war. It is Spies by Michael Frayn. It captures the innocence, adventure and mystery of youth in an evocative manner.

I have a special fondness for WWII naval fiction. Some favorites include HMS Ulysses by Alistair MacLean and The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Monsarrat.

Some good storeis taking place on the fringe of the action are The Raj Quartet books by Paul Scott set in India during World War II and The Balkan Trilogy and The Levant Trilogy by Olivia Manning following a mixed group of expat refugees during the war.

You could do worse than pick any of Alan Furst's excellent books which tend to cover the less well known "battle fronts" from World War II. I recommend Dark Star for no other reason than it was the first of his books that I read.
Das Boot (The Boat) by Lothar-Gunther Buchheim is excellent and was adapted into the well known TV series/film.

Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
Journey into Fear by Eric Ambler or any of his other books
Brideshead Revisited & Sword of Honour by Evelyn Waugh

Message edited by its author, Oct 29, 2006, 3:45pm.

I wonder why nobody mentions Catch 22.

As far as I am concerned some of my favorite books about WW2 are as follows-
Requiem for a Wren by Nevil Shute
The Blue Bicycle by Regina Deforge
Night Falls on the City by Sarah Gainham
and also two other authors are Catherine Gaskin and Catherine Gavin.
Hope this helps.
Ariadne7

I just finished reading Restless by William Boyd. Very interesting book with several twists. Written by a man, the novel tells the story of two women, mother and daughter. Author effectively moves back and forth between 1941 and 1975, letting the mother's story (she was a British spy in US in 1941) unfold for the daughter. Drama builds from beginning to end.

Try The Unknown Soldier by Väinö Linna. It gives the perspective of ordinary finnish soldiers; when it was first published in 1954, Linna was criticized for the lack of a higher meaning and noble sacrifice - the main characters were too grubby, ignorant and realistic for a "proper war book".

I would like to put in a plug for Saints and Villains by Denise Giardina, which is a fictionalized version of the story of German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer. On the naval side Tristan Jones has both a couple of good novels Dutch Treat for example, and I think some memoirs.

The boy in the Striped Pajamas is the most powerful YA book about the Holocaust that I have read in ages.

I recommend A Midnight Clear by William Wharton. It's a very human story about soldiers (American and German) who become isolated from officers, and take the opportunity to come to terms with each other. But things go wrong. It was also made into a very good movie.

Not fiction, but memoirs are two forgotten works I stumbled across several years ago. I apologize for forgetting the authors' names but:
Three Came Back - a young couple (he's with the British embassy, she's American) and their very young son are trapped in Singapore (or Burma) when the Japanese invade. They are interned for the rest of the war. Very interesting and well written.

The Walls Came Tumbling Down - a young Dutch woman has been in a German detention camp for political prisioners when the war ends and makes her way back home. The tail end of the war and very good.

Message edited by its author, Jan 5, 2007, 9:16am.

Historical Fiction, right? So I'll leave out the alternate history suggestions.
W.E.B. Griffin's Brotherhood of War, Corps, and other WWII based Military Fiction.
Philip Kerr's Berlin Noir series, German P.I. pre-WWII, WWII, and post-WWII series.
James Webb - The Emperor's General - post WWII in Japan.

Vasily Grossman's Life and Fate, is the classic epic novel of WWII Russia. It centers on the life in totalitarian Stalinist Soviet Russia, and in particular on the Battle of Stalingrad.

The tale is unrelentingly grim. Nearly every character dies, is betrayed to the Soviet authorities, or simply suffers - and no ordinary suffering, but genuine Slavic deprivation. Political betrayal runs rampant across every class of Stalinist Soviet society with mind-boggling inefficiency.

Grossman recreates the frustration of not knowing why one has been accused of infidelity to the Revolution. Often the victim doesn't know by whom or of what they have been accused.

Grossman somehow imagined that his book would be published in the Soviet Union - as he proposed during the thaw under Nikita Khrushchev. Instead, while Grossman was not molested, his book was taken "under arrest" by the KGB in 1961. Fortunately, Grossman kept two undeclared copies that were smuggled out to the West in 1980 and published in 1985.

I just read Two O'Clock Eastern Wartime by John Dunning, which is something a bit different on the WWII front, set in the U.S. at a New Jersey radio station and looking at the the role of radio and domestic espionage.

I highly recommend Snow Falling in Cedars by David Guterson. Although the main story line concerns a post-WWII murder trial, flashbacks to the war years occupy much of the narrative. The scenes set in a Japanese-American internment camp and the Pacific theater are especially memorable. And the prose is impressive in its own right.

Although not directly about the war, Zoli by Colum McCann follows the life of a gypsy poetess, much of it set around and after WWII in Slovakia, Czechoslavia and Austria. I had not read much about the Romi people and here is a very well-crafted, vivid story.

Has anyone read Leon Uris's QB VII? It's partly a legal thriller set after the war in London where a well-respected doctor sues an Israeli war hero for slander for accusing him of war crimes committed in a death camp. The testimony at the trial brings to light with devastating clarity Dr. Kelno's part in the horror of the Holocaust, and the ending is unforgettable. I read it decades ago and have never quite gotten over it.

Message 66: avaland I had not read much about the Romi people and here is a very well-crafted, vivid story.

avaland, if you're interested in the topic, Fires in the Dark is also really good. It deals with the Roma and the Holocaust (among other things - it's almost 500 pages.)

Message edited by its author, Feb 5, 2007, 7:03am.

One of the best books I've ever read dealing with the Holocaust is Time's Arrow by Martin Amis.

Hi Folks,
I was so impressed with the volume of book recommendations on this list, that I decided to compile a list. I researched and filled in almost all the missing information. Just a couple of ?? where I couldn't find the complete info. In all, there are over 140 titles, some recommendations are for collections or series so they count for more than one. I've saved this in both Excel format and as a Word Table. If anyone would like a copy, send me your email addy, and I'll send you what I have. This has been so helpful for me when I go to my local second hand bookstore which is organized by author lastname. I can scan through the shelves with my list in hand and know if I've found a winner. This list is up to date as of the last post on Feb. 5th and I intend to keep it up because it was a bit of a task to confirm all the titles in one go. Enjoy!!

warbridelass...great idea. please send me a copy at harrises@bayou.com. Thanks.

Piece of Cake by Derek Robinson and sequels

The best WWII novel I've ever read is The Berkut by Joseph Heywood. I can do no better than quote my own review here: "This is my very favorite WWII novel. The plot is ingenious and the ending will amaze, astonish, and shock you. The climax of the book provides a most satisfying ending--if only Hitler had received his comeuppance as he does here. It's too bad that no one ever made a movie out of this book". BTW, I'm new at this, so I have a question. I assume the touchstone checkmark is for popularity, but how is it assigned?

Message edited by its author, Mar 22, 2007, 11:59am.

Jaime638: The checkmark next to a touchstone author or title means that you have that author/title listed in your library.

try guy sajer's forgotten soldier-an alsatian/german's memoir of the eastern front

Message edited by its author, Mar 22, 2007, 6:57pm.

Twilight of Courage By Brock & Bodie Thoene is an excellent one, set at the time of Dunkirk and the invasion of France.

I'm also quite fond of Anatomy of a Battle by Kenneth Macksey which is a fictional accounting of a plausible battalion-sized battle to show how small unit combats played out during the period.

Message edited by its author, Mar 24, 2007, 7:40pm.

I rated Echoes of War by William Riviere very highly as a story of the impact of the two world wars on one family.

I read an editor's copy of an outstanding WWII book, called Autumn Fool by Michael D'Emilio. It's a mix of historical fiction, a love story and a period piece that brilliantly depicts a soldier's disillusion upon returning to his NJ home after the war. It should be available soon on amazon.com

Two YA titles that haven't been mentioned and that I really enjoyed are When the sirens wailed and The Silver Sword. I would also second The Machine Gunners.
A Town Like Alice is an all time favourite of mine and I also enjoyed Requiem for a Wren.
I know this is a historical fiction thread but there are 3 non fiction titles I have to recommend. Schindler's List, Lime street at Two and Christabel Bielenberg's The past is Myself.

Two favourites read many years ago were Mila 18 by Leon Uris (Warsaw Ghetto) & HMS Ulysses by Alistair MacLean.
I notice Forgotten Soldier has been mentioned but I think there is still some dispute over whether this is fiction or fact!
War of the Rats by David Robbins (about Stalingrad - I think Enemy at the Gates was based on this). For an Australian story (and they were the first to inflict a defeat on both the Japs & the Germans on land) try Twenty Thousand Thieves by Eric Lambert, about Tobruk.
I will also second A Piece of Cake by David Robinson - this really shocked me when I read it.
Of course, as the son of a tanker with the Guards Armoured Division, I consider A Bridge Too Far as a work of fiction but I don't think it's very well written either so I won't recommend it. :)

Derblitz109: When I discovered them thirty years ago I became completely immersed in Herman Wouk's The Winds Of War and War And Remembrance. Stopped everything and just read and read and read.

I really enjoyed Five Past Midnight by James Thayer. I read it a long time ago and have since "misplaced" my copy.

I've read several excellent WWII-based books over the last year or so:

The Complete Maus by Art Speigelman (graphic novel)
The Secret Purposes by David Baddiel (deeply moving)
Hitler's Canary by Sandi Toksvig (surprisingly good - aimed at young adults/older children)

Before reading these, I was never really interested in that period of history, but I've since picked up a copy of The Separation by Christopher Priest (having read The Prestige and really enjoying his style). I have a huge pile of books to read (about 70 at the moment), but I plan on getting to it as soon as possible...

I was captivated and deeply moved by Louis de Bernieres' tragi-comic Captain Corelli's Mandolin, the setting of which is the Greek Island of Cephallonia during the Italian occupation in World War Two.

Additionally, I cherish Joseph Heller's Catch-22.

Small Island by Andrea Levy. Such a great book with so many individual voices and separate stories. Very clever and moving.

#s 84 & 85 - I have both those on my shelf waiting to be read. Hearing you guys speak so highly of them makes me a little more anxious to get to them sooner, rather than later!

I'm currently about half-way through The Separation by Christopher Priest and have to say it is excellent - I can definitely recommend this one - especially if it continues to be as good as it has been so far!

Lately I've really enjoyed exploring forgotten corners of the war. I really enjoyed Small Island by Andrea Levy, the story of Jamaican soldiers who fought in the RAF and then discovered they were unwelcome in post-war Britain. I also really enjoyed An Artist of the Floating World by Kazuo Ishiguro. I don't think it's quite as well-written as some of his other stuff, but it's the only novel I've read to consider the war from the Japanese perspective.

I'm a big fan of When the Emperor was Divine, by Julie Otsuka which tells the story of a Japanese-American family put in to an American internment camp. It is a short read, but emotionally powerful and tells the story of the war on the homefront.

I also enjoyed When the Emperor was Divine....forgotten about it...thanks for the reminder.

I picked up When the Emperor Was Divine at the used bookstore the other day. I'm glad to hear that others have enjoyed it!

From a woman's perspective, the following:
Night falls on the city a woman hides her Jewish husband during the Nazi occupation of Vienna
Rumors of Peace a girl in California comes of age during WW2
Five quarters of the orange a mother & daughter are linked in the death of an occupying German soldier & the anger of their neighbors for the retribution that follows
Resistance a Frenchwoman aids in the escape of downed American aviator
The heat of the day
2 women from different classes survive the London blitz.

The Diary of Anne Frank.
The Garden of the Finzi-Continis.
In both, the Nazis loom, but rarely appear. Smoke in the distance.

Finished When the Emperor Was Divine yesterday. I really have to second the recommendation. It's a compact but powerful book that often made me forget I was reading fiction. As the writer shifts from one family member's point of view to another, you see how the experience of internment scarred the lives of the characters - the mother losing her looks and gaiety to the constant battle to provide for her children; children terrified to stand out as Japanese even after the war; the bitter, broken father who speaks with the rage of every man unjustly accused of aiding the enemy. This last section seemed to me exactly what an Afghani or Iraqi person might have said in the wake of September 11.

Fields of Gold
River's Edge both by Marie Bostwick
Thread of Grace by Mary Doria Russell

Message edited by its author, Jun 14, 2007, 11:14am.

Suite Francaise 3 stories about occupied France. Made more poignant once you understand the author's and her family’s life. One of the best books I've ever read.

It must be challenging for an author to come up with a really good historical fiction story about this time since the true stories out of WWII were so dramatic and oftentimes unbelievable. Truth can be stranger than fiction, eh?

I'm reading Steinbeck's Journal of a Novel where he's writing to his editor and talks about how we can read in the paper that a boy kills his parents for not letting him use the car, and we believe it, but if it happens in a novel, we need to be convinced. It sounds contrived. How true!!

Tamar by Mal Peet is a brilliant book about the War, aimed at older Teen/Adult readers. I read a lot of teenage aimed fiction as I run a Teenage Reading group at work, and this novel stood out as exceptional. It also won the Carnegie Prize for Children's fiction.
It tells the story of a girl called Tamar, named by her Grandfather. She has uncovered a family secret, and her Grandfather has set her a task to follow a series of clues that will lead her to the truth about his past.
The book follows her story, but is generously interspersed with the story of her Grandfather and his time with the Dutch Resistance in France during World War II.
Please don't be put off that it is a teen book, it really is worth reading. Read the reviews other people have written on here, they put it much better than I am! It is a 5 star book.

> I was surprised by how much I enjoyed
> Scott Turow's Ordinary Heroes.

I think this book just shows how good a writer Turrow is - pretty far out of his 'element', and still he pulls it off easily. I really liked it.

Yeah, I'm going to have to tackle Grossman one of these days. Tolstoy first, though. I think.

I concur with the recommendation of Enigma by Robert Harris. Wonderfully gloomy book with an excellent twist at the end.

I agree. The Book Thief was a stunning novel... now... if I could only get my copy back from my cousin...

Eye of the Needle is very good and suspenseful.

I recommend Forgotten Fire as a prelude to the Holocaust, the Armenian genocide in 1917 that Hitler used as a model for his Final Solution.

While I would second many of recommendations already made -Life and Fate, The Thin Red Line, Kaputt - one recommendation I would make that I have not seen is for Guard of Honor by James Gould Cozzens. It's an excellent novel about the events on an Air Force base in Florida during the war. There is no combat but thereby reflects a more universal experience of service in a citizen army during WWII. Just one of several excellent by Cozzens who is underestimated because of this conservative viewpoint.

Message edited by its author, Nov 29, 2009, 6:34pm.

I read The Zookeeper's Wife this month, and will be posting a review tonight. I recommend it for the careful and extensive research, the authenticity, the details of daily life, and the charm with which Diane Ackerman tells the story.

As the title implies, it is told from the woman's point of view, and the sensibilities of a wife, a mother, a daughter-in-law, a friend, a nurturer. The courage told in the book is not that of soldiers on the front. It is the courage of unarmed women and children facing brutal SS soldiers while hiding Jewish refugees in their home.

The bibliography alone is a singular find.

Here are some classics;

naval books;
"Run silent, run deep" by Edward Latimer Beach (this is a real treat if you only know it from the movie)
"Tales of The South Pacific" by James Michener
"Away All Boats" by Kenneth Dodson
"The cruel sea" by Nicholas Monsarrat
Goodbye to Some: A Novel by Gordon Forbes

Army / Marines
Battle Cry by Leon Uris
"Into The valley" by John Hersey
"The thin red line" and "From Here to Eternity"( another real treat if you only saw the movie) by James Jones

Occupation after the war;
"The Secret of Santa Vittoria" by Robert Crichton
"A Bell For Adono" by John Hersey
"Armageddon;A novel of Berlin" by Leon Uris

Message edited by its author, Oct 25, 2007, 6:41am.

Not sure if anyone mentioned it but King Rat by James Clavell is an excellent novel. It's set in a WWII Japanese POW camp.

Might as well throw in the works of Gert Ledig since I don't see mention of his name here. They are The Stalin front and Payback. They are extremely graphic. Ledig fought on the Russian front--lost some fingers and had part of his jaw blown off. There is a very subtle and macabre sense of humor running underneath his tales of catastrophes.

Message edited by its author, Dec 22, 2007, 12:45pm.

WWII: Sheila Burnford "Bel Ria"
Timothy Findley "Famous Last Words" (his "The Wars" is WWI)
Eric Linklater "Private Angelo"

and, unlikely as it may seem, Margery Sharp's "Britannia Mews"

Bumping for someone new insterested in this era.

A series of books on the Eastern Front by Sven Hassel is worth a read, told from the German side and pulls no punches. One book in the excellent Casca series which is the same area and side, and one good book I once read by Leo Kessler called The Last Carpathian Wolf.

Alistair MacLean wrote many good WWII novels of which Guns of Navarone and Where Eagles Dare stand out.

Absolutely Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky. I actually listened to it on a wonderful audio. Touching, sad, somewhat humorous, and even charming in the French sort of way. I loved it.

Thanks karen_o, that was me. Already have a fine list from the many recommendations here! For anyone else coming to this, let me add for you:

Darkness Falls From the Air by Nigel Balchin
The Small Back Room by Nigel Balchin
Twelve o'Clock High! by Sy Bartlett and Beirne Lay (hard to find but very worth it as is the film)
Glory For Me by MacKinlay Kantor basis for great 1946 film, "The Best Years of Our Lives."

I wondered if anyone knew of any good novels on the SOE/Bletchly Park, other than Rbt. Harris's Enigma and the disappointing (to me) Charlotte Gray by Sebastian Faulks. Emphasis on the female espionage expereince would be terrific.

Also, another question: My rather odd specialty is collecting first editions of novels that were turned into classical-era Hollywood films (1930s-1949) and many of these are WII novels/films. I've read (and seen) Escape by Ethel Vance (which was a very fine film, MGM, 1940), but am curious about Vance's Reprisal on which I can find nothing. Has anyone heard of it or does anyone know its theme? I know, far fetched, but you never know...

Message edited by its author, Mar 25, 2008, 11:38am.

Twelve O'Clock High, both the book and the film are interesting. There's actually a "trilogy" of American "bomber" films if you match ths one up with John Hersey's The War Lover, the film of which starred Steve McQueen, and then there was also Command Decision which was a play in New York and then a film - starring Clark Gable - which followed many of the same issues as Twelve O'Clock High.

John Hersey and Leon Uris produced a 'duology' when Hersey wrote The Wall and Leon Uris wrote Mila 18 both novels recounting the story of the Warsaw Ghetto and the Jewish uprising there during World War II. Of course, Leon Uris would also write a sort of sequel with his book Exodus - but that's really a post-World War II novel.

Robert A. Mosher

Some good WW2 books are;
A Bell for Adano and Into the Valley also by John Hersey
Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener
The Secret of Santa Vittoria
by Crichton Robert
Run Silent Run Deep by Edward L. Beach
and Away All Boats by Kenneth Dodson

All good boks not read much now a days.

I loved Suite Francaise. I couldn't finish Sarah's Key because the writing wasn't very good. I know some think it's boring, but Cryptonomicon has some good writing about the Pacific theater. Madeleine Bunting's The Model Occupation was one of the inspirations for my book (it's available on Kindle only right now), War on the Margins. Dark Star is the one book by Alan Furst I have read; I should read more of them. He is always searching out details about the beginnings of the war

Has anyone here read Miracle at St. Anna by James McBride? I have it out from the library and I'm wondering whether to push to get it read before the due date.

Has anyone read Day by A.L. Kennedy? She's a British author and this just came out in the States. Its about an RAF bomber pilot struggling to recover from his experiences after the war. The writing is wonderful, but on the whole I'm finding it tough going as its difficult to get invested in the character. Nevertheless, this might appeal to someone else, so tossing it out there. If anyone else has read it, love to hear opinions. I'm about 2/3 of the way through and have returned to my non-fiction WWII with more enthusiasm.

I think someone may have mentioned it, but The True Story of Hansel and Gretel by Louise Murphy, was wonderful and clever.

Let me Go by Helga Schneider was a short, but absolutely horrifying memoir of a woman vistiting her once Nazi mother in a nursing home.

April in Paris by Michael Wallner was interesting it mirros Nemirovsky's Suite Francaise's storyline of an occupied and a Nazi love interest.

These are great suggestions, I'm writing a list, can't wait to get reading.

so glad the word is getting out about The True Story of Hansel and Gretel....a great read.

My favourite WWII novel is Berkut by Joseph Heywood.

David Robbins has some very good books about WWII. War of the Rats, The End of War: a novel and Last Citadel are all very good.

I recently read My Enemy's Cradle by Sara Young -- also quite good.

I'm currently reading the Jeff Shaara books about the lead up to D-Day.

HI all,
I just found this site. Very cool. I love getting recommendations on great fiction to read. I am a huge fan of any stories around pilots. I always wanted to be a fighter pilot so I guess I live vicariously through those stories. Of course I love the movies too but there aren't many out there.
Can anyone recommend some great Fighter Pilot type stories. Romances are good but I like a story with some kind of action to it.

The last book I read was called Forcing the Hand of God by Jacquie Ream. I got it off Amazon. She writes all kinds of book but I learned a little bit about the author and found out that like me she is obsessed with World War II stories. This book is really well written and kind of shows more than war. I like the idea that the main character is the pilot and he is so at odds with his love of flying and his family. I can imagine it must be that way for a lot of combat pilots. There must be such an adrenaline rush that it is hard to give up. Anyway, I really liked it. Oh, there's a strange twist of a relationship in there that was really different and I liked that.

Any recommendations on some good fighter pilot stories? It doesn't have to be World War II. I just know a couple of those guys from our Museum of Flight out here in Seattle and they are really great and honorable men.
Thanks. This is cool!

>125

If you like pilot stories you might try Goodbye to Some: A Novel by Gordon Forbe. It's about about Navy B-24 pilots in WW2.

Another good fighter pilot one, about WW1, is In the Company of Eagles by Ernest K. Gann
They are both out of print but easy to find second hand , I'm sure any good book store can locate copies. I got mine on line from Ebay and Abe Books.

British Author Derek Robinson has several short series about pilots in WWII and WWI, two titles that come to mind are Goshawk Squadron and Damn Good Show. Robert Ryan also has some books like Blue Noon. Another couple are Touch the Face of God by Robert Vaughn and That Summer by Andrew Grieg.

Message edited by its author, Oct 1, 2008, 2:43am.

Another one is H.L. Humes' "The Underground City" (can't get touchstone to come up) which is back in print. It's a literary type of thriller, so may not appeal to everyone and does require some patience, but it's interesting for depicting the geopolitical climate just after the war. The most interesting and riveting part is the middle section which flashes back to what happened to an American agent working with a communist faction of the French Resistance near the end of the war.

Another good read is "Armageddon" by Leon Uris (touch stone goes to wrong book).
It deals with the military goverments set up in occupied Germany even as the war was still raging near the end of of WW2 and goes right to the Berlin Air Lift. Goes into alot of historical background of how the air lift was made a success.

Message edited by its author, Oct 1, 2008, 7:03am.

I've always liked Mother Night by Vonnegut. Granted, I suppose, like all Vonnegut, it is an acquired taste and a great deal of the action occurs post-war...but in his hands a miscreant like Howard W. Campbell, Jr., seems both believable and tragic.

And a nonfiction work that reads like fiction is Diary of a Man in Despair, since I someone else mentioned Anne Frank.

Suite Francaise This book essentially contains two novellas, the first involves the evacuation of Paris in the face of WWII German invasion. The second tells the story of the German occupation of a small French village.

The manuscript is recently discovered of a Jewish author in hiding who died in Authwitz. At no point in the book would you guess this. The depiction of Germen occupation is first class. The writer makes them totally human. So much f it has a modernist revisionist slant, I found mysef doubting the authenticity of the 'find'. But that aside it is a fine narrative.

The boy in striped pyjamas is officially a children's book but also an interesting, if chilling, read. It is about a boy whose SS father becomes commander-in-chief of a concentration camp.

What a fantastic site! Great book recommendations - many I have read and many I plan to! Here is a list of some WWII novels that I have enjoyed.

Gods of War by John W. Toland
Night Sky by Clare Francis
The Cazalet Chronicles by Elizabeth Jane Howard
- The Light Years
- Marking Time
- Confusion
- Casting Off
3 Came Home by A. N. Keith (a true story)
The Children's War by Monique Charlesworth

Message edited by its author, Oct 5, 2008, 4:53pm.

I have been a World War Two entusiast for decades, both as a reader and an author, so I am very pleased to have found this site. My first suggestion about WW2 fiction is always Herman Wouk's classics Winds of War and War and Remembrance for the broad sweep of the war and a rippin' good tale that is impeccably researched. I enjoy all of the (Alan Furst) books about WW2 espionage. Some others that come to mind are A Thread of Grace, Mila 18 and Charlotte Gray.

I, of course, have to recommend my own book Night of Flames which was released in October, 2007 and just recently won the "Outstanding Achievement Award" from the Wisconsin Library Association.

Douglas W. Jacobson
Author, Night of Flames:A Novel of World War Two
http://douglaswjacobson.blogspot.com

Small Death in Lisbon by Robert Wilson is a very good thriller set in Lisbon, Portugal. It starts out in WWII with the hunt for the metal tungsten and has lots in it about science and banking as well as the murder/mystery and spy novel angle. Very much along the same lines as Good German. Nobody has mentioned the new Chris Bohjalian book Skeletons at the Feast. I have it on my to read list but haven't started it yet. I would also add my recommendation for Woman in Berlin. I believe that this book is being made into a movie but I am not sure if it is an English or German production. (I was just in Frankfurt for the Book Fair and can't remember is that is where I saw the movie version being advertized or not.) It will be interesting to see what the producers of the movie do with this book. Will they pretty it up for the movie going public or not?

Does anyone remember Silence over Dunkerque by John Tunis? I vaguely remember reading it back when I was probably around 12 or 13 and liking it. Out of curiosity, I just got hold of a copy on eBay and it should be arriving in the next week or so.

The Reader is set in the late 50s and 80s, but the main plot takes place during World War II. It's one of the better books about post-war German guilt about the Holocaust.

Zoo Station and Silesian Station are two more books set in pre-War Berlin.

> 125 (Fighter pilot stories)

WWI

In the Company of Eagles by Ernest K. Gann
Gentlemen of Adventure by Ernest K. Gann
Goshawk Squadron by Derek Robinson
The Mustering of the Hawks by John Harris
The Blue Max by Jack D. Hunter
Once More the Hawks by Max Hennessy
The Bright Blue Sky by Max Hennessy

WWII

Piece of Cake by Derek Robinson
Eagles at War by Walter J. Boyne
The Last Dogfight by Martin Caidin
Ace by Spencer Dunmore
Goodbye, Mickey Mouse by Len Deighton
Hornet Flight by Ken Follett*
Flight of Eagles by Jack Higgins
633 Squadron by Frederick E. Smith*

Jet Age

Eagle in the Sky by Wilbur Smith
Check Six! by Bob Norris
Warriors by Barrett Tillman
The Last Battle by Barrett Tillman
The Warbirds by Richard Herman
Force of Eagles by Richard Herman
Air Force Eagles by Walter Boyne
Flight of the Intruder by Stephen Coonts*
Final Flight by Stephen Coonts
The Intruders by Stephen Coonts*
The Bridges at Toko-ri by James Michener*

*These stories are technically about people who fly aircraft other than fighters, but they have a similar feel and are well worth reading

Message edited by its author, Dec 2, 2008, 12:09pm.

i'm surprised that nobody has mentioned Once an Eagle by Anton Myrer or the Last Convertable by the same author. Both excellent WWII novels.

I have to pop in here and recommend Fox on the Rhine and Fox at the Front!

I have heard that the two best novels of WWII are From Here to Eternity and The Thin Red Line, both by James Jones. However, I believe this evaluation came from those who possess Degrees in 'English' or 'Literature' or 'the Humanities' and thus may be over-the-heads of those of us who do not. Anyway, both of the films made from these novels were excellent. I remember that King Rat by James Clavell was also very good. It was about a prisoner of war camp run by the Japanese. Many of the best WWII novels were made into good films, such as Bridge over the River Kwai by Pierre Boulle. And let's not forget the oldest, and perhaps the best, war story of all time, the very detailed and realistic The ILLIAD by Homer, still debated after 37 centuries have passed, by scholars, as to whether is a true story. See the film; TROY. Some would say that The Diary of Anne Frank might be the best, but this transcends War Stories by a few notches, definitely in the realm of Literature.

Message edited by its author, Dec 26, 2008, 7:16am.

I really enjoyed "The Good German" BY kanon and " A Small Death in Lisbon" by Robt Wilson

>134, if you have't read Skeletons of the Feast yet, I heartily recommend it! I chose it as my Best Book of 2008.

>136, I'm adding The Reader to TBR. I am currently finishing up my first book of 2009. It's a non-fiction called What We Knew which contains interviews with Jews, German civilians, and German military personnel regarding what they knew about the mass murder of Jews during the war. I would love to read a fictional handling of the topic of post-war guilt.

Just finished The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows and I gave it 4 STARS! It was recently published and it's absolutely wonderful. While about WWII, it's a light, lovely epistolary! Love to here what you think of it!

I really enjoyed Robert Ryan's Night Crossing. It starts in pre-war Germany and follows the lives of three characters who become involved in a love triangle. One of the characters, a German woman, flees to England at the outbreak of the war and is detained as an enemy alien. Her German Nazi soldier fiance and a Scottish inspector are adversaries in the war and as rivals for her affection and there is a tense conclusion to the story.

For a very different book, I enjoyed John Boyne's The Boy In the Striped Pajamas. It is very powerful and also provides an interesting insight into a child's perspective of events.

My own novel, Hitler and Mars Bars, has been compared by readers to Boyne's novel though it is a bit more upbeat. It is based on a true story of a German boy who is brought to Ireland by the Red Cross after the war to recover from the devastation in his homeland. The novel opens in WWII Germany and then moves to Ireland. Readers who enjoyed Boyne's novel or The Book Thief might enjoy my novel too.

It's non-fiction, but Corrie Ten Boom's The Hiding Place reads much like a novel.

Burma Boy by Biyi Bandele is an excellent book with an unusual perspective on the conflict. The protagonist is a young African who joins an African regiment of the British Army to fight in Burma.

I thought that boy in the striped pajamas was historically inaccurate. I can say without a shadow of a doubt that this story never happened. It is a fairy tale. This book provoked much discussion on the Center for Children's Books Bulletin list serve a few years back simply because of the inaccuracies and the false history it portrayed.

The Hunt For Red October by Tom Clancy
King Rat by James Clavell
The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje
Sole Survivor by Derek Hansen and for something a little different try his "Lunch With............." series.

I second the recommendation for Herman Wouk's "The Winds of War" and "War and Remembrance". Excellent books.

Catch 22 is one of my favorite books, highly recommended.

History: a novel by Elsa Morante. One of the best, most moving, most enlightening war stories I ever read. No. The best.

im not sure tht it is WWII but Number the stars is a really good book about Jews and stuff like that

$$$Robbie Harris$$$

Sara's Key by Tatiana DeRosnay, The Bronze Horseman by Paullina Simons. The Bronze Horseman is the first book in a trilogy. Great books! Have gun

For an account of German forces retreating on the Russian front from 1943 (Kursk) onwards try Casca 4: Panzer Soldier by Barry Sadler

Its out of stock but details of how to get this book can be found at http://www.casca.net

She Goes to War by Edith Pargeter (who also wrote the Brother Cadfael mysteries as Ellis Peters) is wonderful. It's a very autobiographical account of her WWII experience.

I have to second the recommendation for The Book Thief. It was a very moving novel.

I also have to recommend two YA novels:

Anne Frank and Me. This book is about a girl who gets "transported" to France during the Occupation and must go into hiding, much like Anne Frank.

The Boy Who Dared. A book based on the true story of Helmuth Hubener, who stood up to the Nazis for what he thought was right, and was sentenced to death at around the age of 16 for it.

Both are wonderful reads --- I'm not usually one to read books over again, but I have read Anne Frank and Me eight times, and it never gets old.

I'd agree about Jackdaws by Ken Follett. It's very interesting and keeps your attention.

I loved a number of books by David L. Robbins including War of the Rats, The End of War, The Last Citadel, and The Assassins Gallery. I love Mr. Robbins books -- they are incredibly researched and well written.

Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose is, of course, amazing. Citizen Soldiers and D-Day June 6, 1944 are also wonderful.

Suite Francaise (Irene Nemirovsky) is a beautifully written book by a Jewish woman living in France before the occupation. It tells stories of fleeing the Germans and of occupation. The stories intertwine and bring life to a time long forgotten. One other title that I enjoyed was My Enemy's Cradle by Sara Young. This book tells the tale of a young Jewish woman who becomes pregnant and ends up in a Nazi Lebensborn home.

Would anyone consider Tamar as a Group Read in conjunction with the YA Group? It is an amazing WWII novel that is technically YA, but reads more adult to me. Let me know if anyone is interested.

loved skeletons at the feast.....dreat ww2 read

also recently liked the boy who dared

The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk is one of my all time favorites

The Cruel Sea by Nicholas Monsarrat is very good

W.E.B. Griffin has written several series; the Brotherhood of War (10 books or so, technically starts just after the end of WWII) and Semper Fi (the first 6 are the best but it goes on for 8-9, Marines perspective of the war in the Pacific)

Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose is of course very good

I also like Rick Atkinson's history of the war in North Africa and Italy... An Army at Dawn and The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-1944 (no touchstone)

Finally anything by Cornelius Ryan, including the movies made from the books

sure and I forgot

Berlin Noir by Philip Kerr; The Balkan Trilogy & The Levant Trilogy by Olivia Manning

apologies for including non-fiction above... but they often read like fiction

anyway a couple more

I've seen The Book Thief mentioned a few times and can highly second the recommendation

also seen Nevil Shute's marvelous A Town Like Alice and like it very much

what else? (can you tell that this is one my favorite genres?)

I have Alan Furst on my to read list (looking forward to a whole new set of books to read) and have read a bit of Jeff Shaara's WWII stuff (and liked it generally)

forgive me as I hog the thread, but I just finished two books by R. Cameron Cooke, Pride runs Deep and Sink the Shigure which I enjoyed... WWII submarine warfare fiction

> 157 brainella, thank you for providing info on My Enemy's Cradle, it sounds great. I'm adding it to my TBR list.

> 158 Anastasia, if you all do a group read of Tamar, post on a link on this thread or send me a message. :) I would be interested, the book sounds really good.

I whole-heartedly agree with any and all recommendations of The Book Thief.

Thanks 165 - I will do that, the soonest it will be will be late August or September as the Group Read for now is already chosen.

Just jumping in here...have read a number of novels by Alan Furst and have to recommend them for placing you into one or another of the far flung capitals during the war and with only a partial perspective of what is going on in the corridors of power and on the battle lines. Strongly recommend Dark Star.

"Famous Last Words" by Timothy Findley is an amazing book about WW2. (His "The Wars" is a heart-breaker about WW1. . . both are unusual and well-worth your time.)

Just chiming in re The Book Thief and Tamar. I'm actually, I think, in the minority for liking Tamar better than The Book Thief. Both are good in different ways, but I really did not like the narrative device (Death as narrator) in TBT. For that reason, Tamar was for me a much better book.

I really need to add Timothy Findley's books to my wishlist. I've been aware of him, but haven't tried his books yet.

If Alan Furst ever stops writing I'll kill myself. Well, maybe nothing that extreme, but I've read everything he's written but one (Dark Voyage) and have gotten the first real sense of what life among people throughout Europe was like, on the ground, in the years leading up to WWII and up through around 1943.

I started with "Dark Star," which was overwhelming for me. I warn you, it's a bit dark, but you get a great sense of the fear people had as Hitler and Stalin were making mayhem and little seemed to be on the horizon to stop them. I love that book.

Then I read "The Polish Officer," which gives you are great sense of how normal people tried to assist in thwarting German moves. Resistance folks rarely get the credit and attention they deserve and this makes you want to cheer and cry for them. I love this book as well.

"Night Soldiers" is a great intro to all of them, even though I read it third. You learn about how young spies were recruited and trained, and see them coming together for action in Spain and beyond. Another great book.

But damn! They're all good. I'll admit to struggling to finish "The World At Night," but you can't have everything.

No matter where you start, you really get transported into a time most of us only heard about in history class or on some TV shows (most of which focus on the big battles anyway).

As I near the end of a Furst book, I start getting blue. Do yourself a favor and leave the formula books behind. This isn't Ian Fleming or Robert Ludlum or any of those guys who have to press every button and turn out stuff that seems like "one from Column A, two from Column B," etc. Furst is the real deal.

I recenlty picked up Hansel and Gretl: The True Story based on recommendations from this list and am on my way to Amazon to check out Findley and Furst immediately.

For a female perspective on the war, has anyone recommended Gone to Soldiers by marge Piercy? If not, I highly recommend that one.

I am also a big fan of Alan Furst (he's on author chat right now btw) and I would also recommend Robert Ryan. His WWII novels ring true to me and he tells good stories!

#125 Fighter Pilots: To The Last Man by Jeff Shaara is a good WWI novel that features Raoul Lufbery and the Red Baron and other fighter pilots.

That author's WWII novels have been mentioned above, and also are good: The Rising Tide, and its sequel The Steel Wave. The third, No Less Than Victory, is due out in the U.S. in November.

Someone Mentioned Fox on the Rhine and Fox at the Front earlier. I wanted to mention them again, and say the general idea behind them. They're placed in WWII, and the idea is an alternate history, starting from the assasination attempt on Hitler in his bunker. In this telling, the briefcase does NOT get nudged under the table and kills it's target. Since Hitler's dead, there's no order given to Rommel to take his own life, and it goes from there. Somewhere I have another alternate history book called SS-GB, I haven't gotten around to reading that one yet though.

I read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. It was a beautiful book. If you're interested, you can check out my review here. =)

Not fiction but a terrific memoir of his time spent with the 14th army in Burma is Quartered Safe Out Here by George MacDonald Fraser O.B.E.

I'm seconding #175's recommendation of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. I just finished it yesterday and it was an instant favourite.
It tells the story of the occupation of Guernsey (which I knew nothing about before reading this book) via a series of letters between and from a London based journalist/writer and the Islanders.

Absolutely - The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society has been one of my favorite books this summer. I have recommended it to everyone I know - even loaned it out, but might have to buy another copy to "chain" to my shelves....

I second the recommendations of the previously mentioned titles:
"The Winds of War" and "War and Remembrence"; "A Town Like Alice";
Two O'Clock Eastern Wartime".

I recommend R.F. Delderfield's two-book saga "The Avenue": Book I "The Dreaming Suburb"(1919-1940); Book II "The Avenue Goes to War (1940-1947).

I also read this series in my teens and really enjoyed them, it may be time for a re visit.

I also read this series in my teens and really enjoyed them, it may be time for a re visit.

I am a big fan of Herman Woulk. He usually told his stories from the point od view of officers. It was great to see the view of privates and corporals in Will and Dena: Love and Life in World War II by Bob Rogers. I recommend the works of both authors, particularly, Will and Dena.

Message edited by its author, Nov 18, 2009, 4:13pm.

If anyone's interested in the dark realities of living under Stalin during the early days of WWII in eastern Poland (now Belarus), I recommend Wave of Terror by Theodore Odrach. Innocent people are randomly deported to labor camps or tortured and/or put to death in prisons. Though a novel, it's based on eyewitness accounts. Publishers Weekly okayed. http://www.librarything.com/work/4588642

#183 - thanks for the recommendation

I am reading Suite Francaise at the moment, and it's very good. The reproductions of the letters of the author's husband as he frantically tries to track her down after her arrest and before his own arrest and deportation to Auschwitz are very poignant.

Anything by Alan Furst is outstanding. If you like realism and atmosphere, good plot, real characters, and beautiful writing, you'll love him.