The Book Topic

[TrustMe]

I agree. I tried reading the Silmarillion once and I nearly blew my mind off with all the pronunciations.

Edited April 19, 2023 by TrustMe

[Mike1158]

I got the Culture series book, printed for Orbit publishing.  The joys of getting older mean that a font size of 8 and tight/close print style may make for a book that is cheaper to print and ship but is a pain to try to read.  Pointless. 

Take into account the smdged print, ompossible to actually read and enjoy the process.  Annoyed beyond this mornings return experience with amazon and trying to get royal slug to do the job right.  This time at least.

[TrustMe]

4 hours ago, Mike1158 said:

I got the Culture series book, printed for Orbit publishing.  The joys of getting older mean that a font size of 8 and tight/close print style may make for a book that is cheaper to print and ship but is a pain to try to read.  Pointless. 

Take into account the smdged print, ompossible to actually read and enjoy the process.  Annoyed beyond this mornings return experience with amazon and trying to get royal slug to do the job right.  This time at least.

If you get the books on kindle. You can change the font size to whatever you want. They cost around 70 or 80 pounds for the cheap ones.

[sunday]

18 minutes ago, TrustMe said:

If you get the books on kindle. You can change the font size to whatever you want. They cost around 70 or 80 pounds for the cheap ones.

No need of a kindle reader. A smartphone works fine.

[Mike1158]

My phone is like me, dumb, err hang on.  Alternate adjective somewhere.......

 

As far as the swindle goes, not a fan.  My neighbour has one and it is forever falling over, needing to be reset to factory settings etc.  She can never get access to her books for more than a day or two and hamazon just cannot get this sorted.

 

As a Trekkie I thought I would love all the tech but truth is, I bleeding well hate it.  Give me a book I can hold and real pages I can turn and I am a happy camper.

[TrustMe]

I can understand the tech thing as my sister won't use a kindle at all.

A bad thing about the kindle is that on paper books VAT is not added, but for electronic books like on the a kindle VAT it is charged at 20%. Sometimes the kindle is more expensive than a paper book which is weird 

[Rick]

"Submarine Commander" by Rear Admiral Ben Bryant.

A good read on British submarines and their crew in W.W.2. Was surprised on the natural ocean environment British submarines operated in. 

[Rick]

Ernie Pyle "The Last Chapter." For the U.S., probably the best W.W.2  journalist and war correspondent. He has written other good W.W. 2 books in "This is Your War" and  "Brave Men." A good Hoosier. 

[futon]

Currently working through two books.

 "Thunder on Bataan, The First American Tank Battles of World War II" by Donald L. Caldwell

 

わが戦車隊ルソンに消えるとも、戦車隊戦記 「丸」編集部編

"Comrades Lost in Our Tank Units in Luzon, Tank Unit War Stories. A collection of articles from 「Maru」”

 

 

 

[NickM]

50 minutes ago, futon said:

Currently working through two books.

 "Thunder on Bataan, The First American Tank Battles of World War II" by Donald L. Caldwell

 

わが戦車隊ルソンに消えるとも、戦車隊戦記 「丸」編集部編

"Comrades Lost in Our Tank Units in Luzon, Tank Unit War Stories. A collection of articles from 「Maru」”

 

 

 

Don Caldwell wrote a couple of excellent unit histories for JG26 the Luftwaffe fighter wing that was stationed on the channel--the famous Abbeville Boys.

[futon]

29 minutes ago, NickM said:

Don Caldwell wrote a couple of excellent unit histories for JG26 the Luftwaffe fighter wing that was stationed on the channel--the famous Abbeville Boys.

So far, Thunder on Bataan is going well. Going from a German fighter setting to an American tank setting in opposite war theaters will take a good author. 

[NickM]

7 minutes ago, futon said:

So far, Thunder on Bataan is going well. Going from a German fighter setting to an American tank setting in opposite war theaters will take a good author. 

 

He's a great 'info digger' He dug up so much info from all sides that it made the perfect reference book for every other US/RAF 8th AF/9th AF/2 TAF/Fighter command memoir written.

[futon]

4 hours ago, NickM said:

 

He's a great 'info digger' He dug up so much info from all sides that it made the perfect reference book for every other US/RAF 8th AF/9th AF/2 TAF/Fighter command memoir written.

Yeah, that was noticed with the beginning chapter that went through some history of the 6 towns where the National Guard had Tank Company's (average of only 4 tanks each, of M2A2 lights -- before that FT17s) as well as some of the people from each town. It drums up greater interest to see how it all ties up through the later, much rougher, years. 

[alejandro_]

On 4/7/2024 at 10:39 PM, futon said:

Currently working through two books.

 "Thunder on Bataan, The First American Tank Battles of World War II" by Donald L. Caldwell”

Thanks, I will put it in my future list

[futon]

26 minutes ago, alejandro_ said:

Thanks, I will put it in my future list

You're welcome.

While the Japanese book is well, not a European language, so hard to recommend, it's good too.

Very brief but one tanker, deployed to Manchuria, then sent to Luzon, his company engaged some M4s, then as a tank-less survior, going around the jungles. Another tanker, sent to a different regiment in Manchuria. Remained there, training for assumed battle with SU, but ultimately, the regiment summoned to home island defense. Training on Chi-Nu tanks started in July.

[alejandro_]

On 5/14/2024 at 4:22 PM, futon said:

You're welcome.

While the Japanese book is well, not a European language, so hard to recommend, it's good too.

Very brief but one tanker, deployed to Manchuria, then sent to Luzon, his company engaged some M4s, then as a tank-less survior, going around the jungles. Another tanker, sent to a different regiment in Manchuria. Remained there, training for assumed battle with SU, but ultimately, the regiment summoned to home island defense. Training on Chi-Nu tanks started in July.

Thank you, it would be great if you can provide a summary with the best anecdotes once you read the book. It is a dark subject with little literature available.

[17thfabn]

I'm five books into Colleen McCullough's seven book historical fiction series on Rome.

It covers the era of Marius & Sulla through Julius Caesar & Augustus Caesar and the end of the Republic and the beginning of the empire to the war against Anthony & Cleopatra. 

Excellent books. I had wondered if  parts of them were used as a basis for the "Rome" series. As far as I can tell they were not used. Two minor characters that pop in the book series are the centurions Vorenus and Pullo. In the books they are both centurions. In the HBO series Vorenus is a centurion, Pullo a ranker legionnaire.  

I don't read many female authors. Not that I avoid them, just most types of books I am interested in are written by males. One thing I've noticed with female authors.They don't get as much into the details of weapons and tactics as a male author general would.

All the copies of these books I've found have very small type with very tight spacing. Most of them are around 700 pages, but would be 900 pages with normal type and spacing. This makes reading them difficult.

Due to this I've been reading them on the kindle app. In a thread about another book some commented on not being a fan of the "kindle". You can use the kindle app on a regular computer or laptop. I'm using the kindle app on my laptop. Makes reading much easier. 

 

 

 

[PaulFormerlyinSaudi]

Oddly, I am getting a lot out of The Employment of Negro Troops (US Army Green Book).  It is sort of an official history of how the Army tried to manage the simple fact that about 12% of the American population in 1940 was Black. 

 

They certainly wanted to use this manpower. But they also did not want to engage in social experiments.  They came up with many wise policies that they could not really implement because the lack of Black officers and NCOs. Adding to it all were the low classification scores of most Black inductees. Making the problem worse, the Navy refused to take their fair share of Black draftees. 

 

Congress required soldiers be assigned to any branch or specialty they were qualified for. Wonderful, now carry out the spirit of that when in 1941 6% of Whites were AGCT Grade I, but only 0.4 of Negroes were.  To look at it another way, 8.5% of Whites were Grade V, but 12% of Negroes were. 

 

It was tough forming most any sort of Black unit without having enough Black leadership.  A fascinating problem. 

 

[alejandro_]

On 3/9/2025 at 12:55 PM, PaulFormerlyinSaudi said:

Oddly, I am getting a lot out of The Employment of Negro Troops (US Army Green Book).  It is sort of an official history of how the Army tried to manage the simple fact that about 12% of the American population in 1940 was Black. 

Very interesting, the book can be found in pdf format here:

https://www.goldenarrowresearch.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Employment-of-Africa-American-Troops-in-WWII.pdf

[PaulFormerlyinSaudi]

Thank you. (But I already bought it.)

[Rick]

Thomas Sowell mentions this in one of his videos.