July RandomKIT: World War II

RandomKIT Challenge July 2026



Read a fiction or nonfiction book related to World War II.

Suggested topics, by no means limited to:
Military history, biographies, spies, the Holocaust,historical fiction, children's books, the homefront, roles of women, other topics or ideas related to World War II.

“Random” titles from my shelves:
An Army in Skirts
The Boys in the Boat
The Diary of a Young Girl
Early Sunday Morning
My Secret War
Number the Stars
What was Pearl Harbor?
When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit

Series:
The Shipyard Girls
American Girls —Meet Molly

Authors:
Susan E. MacNeal
Pam Jenoff
Sarah Sundin
Jacqueline Winspear

Share your reading in this thread, and update the wiki if you so choose: https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/2026_RandomKIT

I should have plenty to fit this theme!

I have two I'm considering:
All Things Wise and Wonderful by James Herriot (1977), which is the 3rd book in his memoirs and takes place during his time in the RAF.
The Little Company by Eleanor Dark (1945) is set as Australia is about to enter WWII.

Great topic! I am planning on reading Last Night with Tokyo Rose by Alexa Kang.

I’m planning on reading The Wartime Sister.

I'll be reading The Last Collection

I'm planning on reading The Zookeeper's Wife.

>4 DeltaQueen50: Thank you. I am in charge of setting up the feature book display in our retirement community library, same topic. There are more books on this topic in our little library than I thought!

I think I'm going to try Operation Mincemeat by Ben MacIntyre.

>9 KeithChaffee: - You've reminded me that I have Agent Zigzag by MacIntyre on my TBR. Maybe I'll tackle that one.

>9 KeithChaffee: >10 dudes22: I've really enjoyed the Macintyre books I've read (including Operation Mincemeat), so would definitely recommend them!

I plan to read Khaki Town by Judy Nunn, set in Townsville, Australia.

I just started
ANGELS OF RESISTANCE
by Noelle Salazar.
Historical fiction, WWll in the Netherlands.

I can highly recommend Requiem for a Wren for this.

So many to choose from! I may read Eggs or Anarchy, a biography of Lord Woolton.

I have finished Unter Wölfen by Alex Beer. It is set in 1942 in Nuremberg. A local resistance group asks a Jewish man threatened with deportation to impersonate a Gestapo officer sent from Berlin to investigate a murder and to find some important papers which they want to pass on to the British.

I read Death in Captivity by Michael Gilbert, a murder mystery set in an Italian POW camp in 1943. Gilbert himself was captured during World War II and escaped from an Italian camp, so many of the novel's details undoubtedly come from his experience!

RandomKIT July: WWII
It Begins in Betrayal by Iona Whishaw

I completed The Last Collection which takes place in the lead up to the German invasion of Paris 1938-39.

>20 LibraryCin: Sorry that one wasn't to your tastes.

>21 thornton37814: Yeah, it looks like others liked this a lot more than I did. It has a high star rating.

I read Meet Molly from the American Girls book series. It seemed like it ended abruptly though.

I finished Operation Mincemeat by Ben Macintyre.

I have finished Nordlicht – Die Spur des Mörders where the end of the Second World War and the German refugees stranded in Denmark provide the motivation for a murder.

Just a head's up that the August RandomKIT has been posted: https://www.librarything.com/topic/385503#n9236039

I have completed my read of the oh-so-long Last Night with Tokyo Rose by Alexa Kang.

I finished William Gibson’s Archangel, a graphic novel about time travel and WWII. I am not too wild about the artwork - a little too fussy for my taste, and lacking clarity except for the cover art.
I am not sure I buy the time travel logic either. Why travel to a split-of universe to make sure it turns out the same way your own has? And why would people in this universe lose their memories after the conclusion of ‘the mission’ - since this is how it has always been in this universe?

I read War Hawk by James Rollins which refers to Turing's research during WWII

The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris ★★★★


In April 1942, Lale Sokolov, a Slovakian Jew, is forcibly transported to the concentration camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau. When his captors discover that he speaks several languages, he is put to work as a Tätowierer (the German word for tattooist), tasked with permanently marking his fellow prisoners. Imprisoned for over two and a half years, Lale witnesses horrific atrocities and barbarism—but also incredible acts of bravery and compassion. Risking his own life, he uses his privileged position to exchange jewels and money from murdered Jews for food to keep his fellow prisoners alive. One day in July 1942, Lale, prisoner 32407, comforts a trembling young woman waiting in line to have the number 34902 tattooed onto her arm. Her name is Gita, and in that first encounter, Lale vows to survive the camp somehow and marry her. A vivid, harrowing, and ultimately hopeful re-creation of Lale Sokolov's experiences as the man who tattooed the arms of thousands of prisoners with what would become one of the most potent symbols of the Holocaust, The Tattooist of Auschwitz is an unforgettable work of historical fiction and a testament to the endurance of love and humanity under the darkest possible conditions.

This book is hard to describe my feelings while reading it. The tale would be unbelievable if it weren't a true story. We do not often get tales from those who assisted the Nazis to survive.

I read Half American by Matthew Delmont, about Black Americans' participation in the war effort in the face of Jim Crow bigotry.