Lock and Load! A Military History/Fiction Reading Room

I never really can get into Clancy books. I liked Rainbow Six, that's about it. I also tried to read a Jack Higgins book. SHUDDER..

Rainbow Six is a bit more action intensive than the other Clancy books, not a bad thing, just..... different.

Jack Higgins' stuff can be unusual. I mean, one of my favourite military fiction novels is The Eagle Has Landed. The sequel to it was extremely contrived and very convenient, but what the heck? Most of his other books haven't been to my liking, except perhaps Storm Warning, which was just different enough to drag me in and keep me reading.

Has anyone read "Combat"? It is an anthology of military writers, including Bond, Brown, Coonts, James Cobb, Coyle, Ing, etc. I have only read 3 of the stories, and they were pretty good.

Has anyone read "Combat"? It is an anthology of military writers, including Bond, Brown, Coonts, James Cobb, Coyle, Ing, etc. I have only read 3 of the stories, and they were pretty good.

What a coincidence, I'm reading it right now. I've just started on Coonts' story.

'Storm Warning' is the Higgins book I read, and hated.

Well then, read The Eagle Has Landed. The concept sounds a bit farfetched at first, but as you get into it, you end up with a new respect for the Fallschirmjager. A few technical details are blatantly incorrect - ie the Germans didn't have a Parachute Regiment, they had 12 Parachute Divisions, and it's unlikely, once you look at the timeline of WW2, that an FJ like Oberst Steiner could have done all that he is decribed as doing after the invasion of Crete (going to North Africa, then Leningrad, then Stalingrad, then a cameo appearance at the clearance of the Warsaw Ghetto), but if you disregard those errors, you have an enjoyable action thriller, which is the point of military fiction.

A discussion of Bravo Two Zero would fit nicely here, except that it isn't fiction.

Uh, actually, according to the book The Real Bravo Two Zero by Michael Asher (former 23rd SAS trooper), Andy McNab's account of the mission is virtually a work of fiction. Asher looked at all the available declassifed material relating to the patrol, including statements by the SAS Regiment's RSM, Peter Ratcliffe, among other things. The determination was made that both Chris Ryan and Andy McNab fabricated a lot of stuff, basically in order to cover up their own faults and failures.

Lets not forget the old Rogue Warrior him self Richard "NMA" Marcinko. For those of you who are not familiar or just plain never heard of him, I suggest you go right now and pick up his autobiography, or his first fiction novel titled "Red Cell", it's best to start at the begining. If you like Clancy, you'll love Dick Marcinko. His Rogue Warrior books in my opinion are some of the best. You can check out his Ten Commandments of spec-war in my profile. Go buy em'... BUY EM' ALL!

www.simonsays.com Check dis out!

Uh, actually, according to the book The Real Bravo Two Zero by Michael Asher (former 23rd SAS trooper), Andy McNab's account of the mission is virtually a work of fiction. Asher looked at all the available declassifed material relating to the patrol, including statements by the SAS Regiment's RSM, Peter Ratcliffe, among other things. The determination was made that both Chris Ryan and Andy McNab fabricated a lot of stuff, basically in order to cover up their own faults and failures.


I've never heard of this book, though I suppose I would initially be skeptical of a book written by someone who wasn't there that debunks the accounts of someone who was. Admittedly, McNab's book likely covers events the way he remembers them, which may not be exactlythe way they happened.

However, I still give the benefit of the doubt to McNab's account.

Herman, I too was initially sceptical, but after having read Asher's book, and having spoken to some acquaintances, I came to the conclusion that McNab's and Ryan's accounts of their patrol were somewhat entertaining fiction. When the RSM of 22SAS starts criticising the facts as presented by his subordinates, you know something is up.

Truth be told, the subject matter of any such book is so sensitive, a reader has to take anything written in such an account with a grain of salt - it's the only way to not be disappointed.

I just finished reading Stephen Ambrose's "The Wild Blue: Those that flew the B-24". It was short, by Ambrose's standards, but a good accounting of the air war against Germany in WWII.

There was an author that people say is a good writer, but it seems all he writes is World War II Nazi stuff, which I get sick of reading. I can't recall his name at the moment though...

::goes back to reading CARDINAL::

Thanks go out to Lord Bane for the title change. Hopefully there won't be as much confusion as to what is discussed here!

I just finished Peter Caves' Foxbat, about the guy who defected from Russia with the MiG-25 Foxbat plane. The chapters with Vologsky (the defector) were completely enthralling, the rest...not so great. I've started Bart Davis' Raise the Red Dawn, about a sub that gets trapped under the Artic ice.

What do you guys think of The Fisto of God.Fantastic insight in the Gulf War.

Stephen Coonts is probibally my favorite military author. I like seeing Jake Grafton progress from a lieutenant in Vietnam to an admiral, now a days.

Clancy is my second favorite, the reason not the first is because sometimes the books get really long winded. I don't mind it to much, though.

Clancy also has a VERY bad habit of naming two characters similar names, and usually they are Russian, which makes keeping track of them oh-so difficult.

That's for sure. They all look the same to me. Alot of the Russians also have the name Ivan or Sergey (or Sergei)also.

what about non fiction?

Non-fiction falls within the Historical aspect of this thread.

This fall I will be requiring my students to do a book review for my intro to history class. What books would you recommend I put on my list of approved topics? I will be teaching US History Reconstruction to present day, so any suggestions need to stay in that timeframe.