Sign in with Facebook
Morgan Blackledge's Reviews > The Story of World War II: Revised, expanded, and updated from the original text by Henry Steele Commager
The Story of World War II: Revised, expanded, and updated from the original text by Henry Steele Commager
by
by
This is pretty much exactly what you'd expect from a book titled the Story of WWII.
It's a broad compendium of the important events from the different theaters, major battles and important figures in WWII.
Lots of cool little excerpts from the perspective of different political leaders, generals, field commanders, soldiers and civilians.
Lots of big insights about the extreme hardships people can endure and what kinds of bonds people can form under such conditions.
Lots of really gross, really graphic descriptions of some truly ghastly carnage.
Lots of accounts of unconscionable racism.
Lots of grim as hell descriptions of some the worst atrocities committed in history.
An estimated 20 to 80 million people died
In WWII. Countless others were maimed or wounded or were psychiatric casualties.
Each of those individuals was a human being who wanted to live and be happy. Trying to take all that in literally staggers the mind.
Anyway, reading these stories and first hand accounts not only opens my eyes to what people can endure, it also helps me put my personal challenges into perspective.
Two generations ago I might have been eating horse manure and corpses in order to survive a famine or crouching in terror as my city was carpet bombed with incendiaries.
I'm grateful to say that today my worst anxieties are the advanced mileage on my leased Prius and the differed maintenance on my house.
If people can fly 25 bombing missions over hostile enemy territory or storm the beach at Normandy I aught to be able to handle that.
I have been reading a bunch of WWI and WWII history lately. The experience has been truly inspiring and disturbing and insight provoking.
I have to say, some of the most poignant material in the book is towards the end in the section that covers the atomic bombing of Japan. The book gives you the perspective of the executives planning the mission, the crew in the plane that dropped the bomb and the people on the ground in the aftermath of the bombing. You feel real empathy with everyone of the perspectives. What your left with is a very complex, hard to describe feeling.
If you're in the mood for what I'm describing, this book is like an all you can eat buffet. You can really pig out, and by the end you'll have had way more than enough, probably even too much.
It's a broad compendium of the important events from the different theaters, major battles and important figures in WWII.
Lots of cool little excerpts from the perspective of different political leaders, generals, field commanders, soldiers and civilians.
Lots of big insights about the extreme hardships people can endure and what kinds of bonds people can form under such conditions.
Lots of really gross, really graphic descriptions of some truly ghastly carnage.
Lots of accounts of unconscionable racism.
Lots of grim as hell descriptions of some the worst atrocities committed in history.
An estimated 20 to 80 million people died
In WWII. Countless others were maimed or wounded or were psychiatric casualties.
Each of those individuals was a human being who wanted to live and be happy. Trying to take all that in literally staggers the mind.
Anyway, reading these stories and first hand accounts not only opens my eyes to what people can endure, it also helps me put my personal challenges into perspective.
Two generations ago I might have been eating horse manure and corpses in order to survive a famine or crouching in terror as my city was carpet bombed with incendiaries.
I'm grateful to say that today my worst anxieties are the advanced mileage on my leased Prius and the differed maintenance on my house.
If people can fly 25 bombing missions over hostile enemy territory or storm the beach at Normandy I aught to be able to handle that.
I have been reading a bunch of WWI and WWII history lately. The experience has been truly inspiring and disturbing and insight provoking.
I have to say, some of the most poignant material in the book is towards the end in the section that covers the atomic bombing of Japan. The book gives you the perspective of the executives planning the mission, the crew in the plane that dropped the bomb and the people on the ground in the aftermath of the bombing. You feel real empathy with everyone of the perspectives. What your left with is a very complex, hard to describe feeling.
If you're in the mood for what I'm describing, this book is like an all you can eat buffet. You can really pig out, and by the end you'll have had way more than enough, probably even too much.
Sign into Goodreads to see if any of your friends have read
The Story of World War II.
Sign In »
Reading Progress
February 4, 2015
–
Started Reading
February 4, 2015
– Shelved
February 26, 2015
–
Finished Reading
Comments Showing 1-4 of 4 (4 new)
date
newest »
newest »
message 1:
by
Thomas
(new)
Feb 28, 2015 11:22AM
Nice looks like a good one..!
reply
|
flag
I totally agree with this review!! Although it took me over a month to read because of its size I really enjoyed it. I especially enjoyed the stories of the Pacific theater campaign which with great imagery described the side of war that was not packed full of "glorified" language. The harshness of battles like Midway, Guadlcanal, and Iwo Jima really surprised me because of the gore that was involved in these strides for world domination and the US struggle to rebute these advances by the Japanese.
This story has one the most impressive accounts of World War II. This book gives you a a great description of how World War II was like. The author used his clever ways to make this book perfect. It talks about all the military branches. The Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Army.He went through all the important details in this book to make readers interested i this book. Donald L. Miller made this a very interesting book. Many should know about the history of the world.
Well. Thanks guys. Sorry for the (7 year) delay in this response. Better late than ever I guess?
