Reading List

Tom Ricks lists his Top Ten Books Anyone Interested in U.S. Military History Should Read:

• Washington's Crossing by David Hackett Fischer
• Battle Cry of Freedom by James M. McPherson
• Son of the Morning Star by Evan S. Connell
• Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose
• Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
• With the Old Breed at Peleliu and Okinawa by E.B. Sledge
• Thunder Below! by Eugene Fluckey
• Korea: This Kind of War by T.R. Fehrenbach
• Achilles in Vietnam by Jonathan Shay
• The Nightingale's Song by Robert Timberg

Ricks has written his own book which is on my list of things to read: The Gamble: General David Petraeus and the American Military Adventure in Iraq.

From the list above, I can personally attest to the Eugene B. Sledge book; I loved that book and read it twice. I had just watched the Ken Burns series, The War, and heard about Sledge on there. I highly recommend his book.

I would add another book to the list, Flights of Passage, by Samuel Hynes. Hynes flew planes, like my dad, and he wrote about the monotony of day to day life and how it was so juxtaposed with those inevitable sudden, intense moments.

Go here to read his post and his comments on each book.



H/T: Instapundit