This is my inaugural wish list for books. I hope to post future wish lists every month. The first book is Vasily Grossman’s A Writer at War: Vasily Grossman with the Red Army, 1941-1945. Vasily has been desrcibed as Russia’s Ernie Pyle. This appears to be a personal viewpoint of the Russian/German conflict in World War II.
The second book on my wish list is Catherine Merridale’s Ivan’s War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945. In contrast to Grossman’s book, Merridale takes a more traditional, objective look at the war between the Russians and the Germans. These two books will hopefully shed some light on an area of World War II that has not been discussed much in the West – the Russian side of the war.
The third book is Dick Winters’ Beyond Band of Brothers: The War Memoirs of Major Dick Winters. As the title infers, this appears to further detail the exploits of Easy Company from the book Band of Brothers. I look forward to reconnecting with Easy Company.
The last book is Sean Naylor’s Not a Good Day to Die: The Untold Story of Operation Anaconda. I have become more interested in America’s recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. I hope that Naylor’s book will explain what happened in one of the war in Afghanistan’s most reported battles.