The past is never dead, it isn’t even past
Sword: D-Day - Trial by Battle, by Max Hastings A new work by Max Hastings, éminence grise of military historians, is always an eagerly anticipated event. In recent years we have been treated to his brilliant accounts of Vietnam, the Dambusters raid (Chastise),...
The subtitle of this book is ‘Anglo American Rivalry and the hidden story of the Normandy Campaign’ and the theme is American political and military machinations to ensure that Allied strategy in the Second World War was diverted to the support of American interests...
Echoing Greens: How Cricket Shaped the English Imagination, by Brendan Cooper It is now a cliché - perhaps always has been - to refer to cricket as a rich quarry for artistic achievement, even as mainstream coverage becomes less fixated on the written word and more...
Korea: War Without End, by Richard Dannatt and Robert Lyman This is of seminal importance to our appreciation of the importance of the Korean War. The authors combine strategic military awareness with the necessity of providing historical analysis built on thorough...
Prince Rupert of the Rhine: King Charles I’s Cavalier Commander, by Mark Turnbull Following his extraordinary study of Charles I’s private life, Mark Turnbull now turns his attention to another major player in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, Prince Rupert of the...
The Judgment of Stars, by Jane Thynne The Judgement of Stars is the sixth book in Jane Thynne’s Clara Vine noir thriller series, set in Germany and following a chronology from Black Roses, set in the early 1930s, to The Judgement of Stars in 1942. Clearly, there is...
Crusader, by Adam Staten Crusader is the third and final book in Staten’s Honour Bound trilogy, following on from Blood Debt and Oath Breaker, both of which were released in 2024 and both of which I reviewed for Aspects of History if you wish to go back to catch up on...
Those Who Are About To Die: Gladiators and the Roman Mind, by Harry Sidebottom Harry Sidebottom has written an invaluable work for scholars and storytellers alike. Those Who Are About To Die is a masterclass in how to both educate and entertain the reader...
1945: The Reckoning: War, Empire and the Struggle for a New World, by Phil Craig How does one make any sense of the end of the Second World War in Asia in 1945, a war that ended just as quickly and unexpectedly as it had begun? Thirty-nine agonizing months separated...
Operation Nightfall, by Karl Wegener The year is 1948. Mankind is still reeling from the effects of WWII. Politics causes mass division. Tyranny threatens to take over. Tensions are high, deception is rife, yet hope persists. Following the events that occurred between...
