Last book you read?

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Shell said:
What would be your favourite war??

Or perhaps what is the most underrated war.
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Probably World War 1 is my most "underrated". There are a few more books I still need to get though. Plus I have a direct ancestor who served both at Gallipoli and the Western Front and was decorated.

It was also the first war with tanks. First with aircraft. First with chemical weapons. First major genocide (not that anyone actually took notice of it at the time, it's still relatively unknown).

Otherwise, the American Civil War is endlessly fascinating with a mountain of excellent books. I've started reading a little on the American War of Independence too.

So for "favourite", probably WW1 or WW2.
 
Partridge said:
Probably World War 1 is my most "underrated". There are a few more books I still need to get though. Plus I have a direct ancestor who served both at Gallipoli and the Western Front and was decorated.

It was also the first war with tanks. First with aircraft. First with chemical weapons. First major genocide (not that anyone actually took notice of it at the time, it's still relatively unknown).

Otherwise, the American Civil War is endlessly fascinating with a mountain of excellent books. I've started reading a little on the American War of Independence too.

So for "favourite", probably WW1 or WW2.
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Oh yeah i saw a good movie about the Civil war and also a documentary.

I have gone blank re the film. Would have been in cinemas around 2018 iirc
 
Cursed Cat said:
Read anything else by Carey, CE (I haven't) ?

Also, in True History of the Kelly Gang, there was a reeeeally weird character in it for a short period, ''Shan'' who was a courier (delivers a message for Harry Power at one stage) - Shan is referred to at one point as a ''substitute boy (or maybe child)" and he clearly freaks the people out whom he lives with - I found that whole bit very odd and even a bit unsettling - he plays some weird game where he jumps around the furniture and leaps up to touch the roof with his long arms and fingers - really weird, couldn't find much about it online ...

The passage where Kelly hears a Banshee's cry was great too. And Joe Byrne was maybe the best character in the book.

I've been on a bit of a Kelly kick since I finished it up, just refreshing my knowledge of what I knew about Kelly and his gang.
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catempire said:
It has been many years and I can’t remember that exact passage. Haven’t read any other Carey. In a similar style is Gary Linnell’s “Buckley’s Chance”. I commend it to you.
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His Kelly Gang was very good.
So was/is his Illywhacker
 
Partridge said:
Probably World War 1 is my most "underrated". There are a few more books I still need to get though. Plus I have a direct ancestor who served both at Gallipoli and the Western Front and was decorated.

It was also the first war with tanks. First with aircraft. First with chemical weapons. First major genocide (not that anyone actually took notice of it at the time, it's still relatively unknown).

Otherwise, the American Civil War is endlessly fascinating with a mountain of excellent books. I've started reading a little on the American War of Independence too.

So for "favourite", probably WW1 or WW2.
Click to expand...
Sounds like you're a bit of a history buff. Weird question but I've been looking for resources on the Iran-Iraq war and haven't been able to find much. You have any leads? I listened to a military podcast about it and have been interested ever since but got nothing
 
Partridge said:
Back to OP....

Last book I finished was The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridley. Very good.

Currently on Rationality by Steven Pinker.
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Ridley’s is in my ‘to read’ pile. Any good?
 
Partridge said:
Probably World War 1 is my most "underrated". There are a few more books I still need to get though. Plus I have a direct ancestor who served both at Gallipoli and the Western Front and was decorated.

It was also the first war with tanks. First with aircraft. First with chemical weapons. First major genocide (not that anyone actually took notice of it at the time, it's still relatively unknown).

Otherwise, the American Civil War is endlessly fascinating with a mountain of excellent books. I've started reading a little on the American War of Independence too.

So for "favourite", probably WW1 or WW2.
Click to expand...

I'm recently started reading "The Photographer of the Lost" by Caroline Scott, it's classed as a historical fiction novel but inspired by the real world events in the wake of WWI, so it's actually set after the war

I was given it by a workmate for Christmas - he bought gifts for most of us just before Xmas such as books, and it's a subject we've never talked about & not sure what made him pick that book for me, but it's a book I've connected with immediately. Part of it's synopsis:

"1921. The Great War is over and families are desperately trying to piece together the fragments of their broken lives. While many survivors have been reunited with their loved ones, Edie’s husband Francis has not come home. He was declared ‘missing, believed killed’ during the war, but when Edie receives a mysterious photograph in the post, taken by Francis, hope flares. And so she begins to search.

Francis’s brother, Harry, is also searching. Hired by grieving families to photograph gravesites, he has returned to the Western Front. As Harry travels through battle-scarred France, gathering news for British wives and mothers, he longs for Francis to be alive, so they can forgive each other for the last conversation they ever had."

While it's from the British perspective & I'm 3rd generation Aus, my grand father fought in WWI on the Western Front in France - opening the novel there's a map of the Western Front with the main battle locations & I was able to recognise some from having read my grandfathers military records
 
Phipppppa said:
I read a book about the person who tattooed the numbers in the concentration camps. Great read. Shocking topic.
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The Tattooist of Auschwitz? Great read
 

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CatToTheFuture said:
Sounds like you're a bit of a history buff. Weird question but I've been looking for resources on the Iran-Iraq war and haven't been able to find much. You have any leads? I listened to a military podcast about it and have been interested ever since but got nothing
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No can't say I do sorry. Bit too recent if that's the right way to say it.
 
CatToTheFuture said:
Sounds like you're a bit of a history buff. Weird question but I've been looking for resources on the Iran-Iraq war and haven't been able to find much. You have any leads? I listened to a military podcast about it and have been interested ever since but got nothing
Click to expand...
There's not much in English, although a little bit has been published recently drawing on documents from Iraqi archives that were seized after 2003. There is some niche stuff out there - a guy called Tom Cooper has published a lot about the air war - and plenty of stuff about the wars broader role in Middle Eastern affairs, but not many traditional military histories.

EDIT: Cooper used to have a website where early versions of the stuff he's now published with Helion and Osprey lived. Here's one article on a particular phase of the war: http://web.archive.org/web/20120217...?option=com_content&task=view&id=64&Itemid=47
 
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Partridge said:
No can't say I do sorry. Bit too recent if that's the right way to say it.
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Yeah sure. Personally I think the cold wars are by favourite to read about. Soviets in Afghanistan, Americans in Vietnam. Just world leaders trying to use military tools to achieve political objectives and spending a decade failing but defending their failures.
 
thejester said:
There's not much in English, although a little bit has been published recently drawing on documents from Iraqi archives that were seized after 2003. There is some niche stuff out there - a guy called Tom Cooper has published a lot about the air war - and plenty of stuff about the wars broader role in Middle Eastern affairs, but not many traditional military histories.

EDIT: Cooper used to have a website where early versions of the stuff he's now published with Helion and Osprey lived. Here's one article on a particular phase of the war: http://web.archive.org/web/20120217...?option=com_content&task=view&id=64&Itemid=47
Click to expand...
Thanks! I'll give it a read
 
cats_09 said:
I'm recently started reading "The Photographer of the Lost" by Caroline Scott, it's classed as a historical fiction novel but inspired by the real world events in the wake of WWI, so it's actually set after the war

I was given it by a workmate for Christmas - he bought gifts for most of us just before Xmas such as books, and it's a subject we've never talked about & not sure what made him pick that book for me, but it's a book I've connected with immediately. Part of it's synopsis:

"1921. The Great War is over and families are desperately trying to piece together the fragments of their broken lives. While many survivors have been reunited with their loved ones, Edie’s husband Francis has not come home. He was declared ‘missing, believed killed’ during the war, but when Edie receives a mysterious photograph in the post, taken by Francis, hope flares. And so she begins to search.

Francis’s brother, Harry, is also searching. Hired by grieving families to photograph gravesites, he has returned to the Western Front. As Harry travels through battle-scarred France, gathering news for British wives and mothers, he longs for Francis to be alive, so they can forgive each other for the last conversation they ever had."

While it's from the British perspective & I'm 3rd generation Aus, my grand father fought in WWI on the Western Front in France - opening the novel there's a map of the Western Front with the main battle locations & I was able to recognise some from having read my grandfathers military records
Click to expand...
An enticing review. I’ll put that on my list
 
I know it's a graphic novel, but has anyone else read Maus? I read it a few years ago having borrowed it from my brother, and right now could easily it again

There's no doubt the Holocaust is a heavy subject, but I feel a book like this has the ability to reach an audience that won't necessarily read a textbook or full novel on the subject - I know the following is happening in America, but they aren't the first place to ban Maus

 
cats_09 said:
I know it's a graphic novel, but has anyone else read Maus? I read it a few years ago having borrowed it from my brother, and right now could easily it again

There's no doubt the Holocaust is a heavy subject, but I feel a book like this has the ability to reach an audience that won't necessarily read a textbook or full novel on the subject - I know the following is happening in America, but they aren't the first place to ban Maus

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What the f***?!
 
cats_09 said:
I know it's a graphic novel, but has anyone else read Maus? I read it a few years ago having borrowed it from my brother, and right now could easily it again

There's no doubt the Holocaust is a heavy subject, but I feel a book like this has the ability to reach an audience that won't necessarily read a textbook or full novel on the subject - I know the following is happening in America, but they aren't the first place to ban Maus

Click to expand...

So checking their reasoning they say they banned out for 8 swears and a picture of a naked mouse

I call bull****.
 
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