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      "Callsign Hades" by Patrick Bury 

      by
      Magda
       Number of Views: 524 
      1. Categories:
      2. History,
      3. Memoire/Battlefield Memoire,
      4. Non-Fiction
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      I actually finished this book last weekend, but have found it hard to write a review. This is not because the book isn’t good – it is. It really is, it’s excellent. It has been difficult to write a review for two reasons. The first – and here I go, being all girly – I found it upsetting. You know, even before you start the first chapter, that someone is going to die. You know who, you know when and you know how. This means that throughout the entire book, you are just waiting for the moment to arise when one of Patrick Bury’s men doesn’t make it back, and the waiting is one of the many things which make the book so effective. There is a pervasive sense of something I can’t quite find words to describe as the narrative draws nearer and nearer to the inevitable – sadness, mixed with anger, trepidation and resignation. The second reason is that there is just too much to talk about. It is encyclopaedic in its breadth, covering a wide range of themes to do with war, Afghanistan and the war in Afghanistan. I’ve rewritten this review about 7 times so far.
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      'The Sea Painter's World' by Geoff Hunt 

      by
      Seaweed
       Number of Views: 729 
      1. Categories:
      2. History,
      3. Naval,
      4. Non-Fiction,
      5. Art & Poetry
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      Geoff Hunt is a Past President of the Royal Society of Marine Artists and in this book, besides presenting us with images of his work, explains in considerable depth the practical side of how he goes about his art; at a level, it is a master class; the reader will emerge fully equipped to become a marine artist save only for his own want of talent.

      The scope of the book’s subjects is large, from large (a battle cruiser) to small (racing dinghys), from Mary Rose to modern, via the ever-evocative age of fighting sail - picturesque now; brutal in its day. We see the artist mostly in oils - beautiful reproductions of finished work and also sketches - but also, showing his versatility, in watercolour and other media.
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      Haynes Owners’ Workshop Manual : NASA SPACE SHUTTLE – by Dr David Baker 

      by
      Ageing_Gracefully
       Number of Views: 886 
      1. Categories:
      2. History,
      3. Non-Fiction,
      4. Non-Naval
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      12 April 1981. That is the date that the first Space Shuttle lifted off marking a time in space exploration history. The Shuttle no longer flies so had a lifespan of only 30 years. The Shuttle was envisaged as a ‘taxi’ which would take astronauts and equipment into space, being re-usable it was thought that it would eventually be a case of take-off, deliver, land, refurb then back into the cycle. It proved to be a bit more complex than that with almost complete rebuilds of the Shuttles each time. Certainly they were examined thoroughly, especially after losing the first Shuttle.

      Dr Baker gives an excellent history of the Shuttle from the concept phase; back in the 1960’s where scientists were looking to get craft and men to a space station on the Moon. The concept was first made public by NASA in 1968 when Head of Manned Space flight at NASA, Dr George Mueller presented a paper to the British Interplanetary Society in London. Dr Baker takes us through the phases/concepts/ideals that all went in to the final design of the Shuttle and its first flight on 12 April 1981. As ever, the overarching consideration was money, which went a long way to deciding the final concept.
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      THE ROYAL BRITISH LEGION – 90 YEARS OF HEROES by Matt Croucher GC 

      by
      Ageing_Gracefully
       Number of Views: 551 
      1. Categories:
      2. History,
      3. Memoire/Battlefield Memoire,
      4. Naval,
      5. Non-Fiction
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      This book has been brought out to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the Royal British Legion. Matt Croucher GC has brought together stories of 90 men and women who he considers to have “done more than the ‘odd thing’ for their country or for the RBL”. Many of the people have been awarded the highest gallantry awards; Victoria Cross, George Cross/George Medal, but there are others such as Sgt Fred Kite RTR who won the Military Medal and two bars, and some have no awards at all!

      Royalties from this book will go to the Royal British Legion.

      The book is divided into 9 chapters with a decade given to each chapter. The people chosen are not representing the year they have been set against but to demonstrate the wide variety of military and peacetime experiences that the past century has thrown up. Many are from the First World War, before the RBL had been set up, but RBL had been set up to assist the people from that war so it is right that they feature so well in this book.
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      "The Life and Exploits of a Maltese Sailor" by Danny Marks 

      by
      Seaweed
       Number of Views: 756 
      1. Categories:
      2. History,
      3. Memoire/Battlefield Memoire,
      4. Naval,
      5. Non-Fiction
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      “Splendaciously mendacious rolled the brassbound man ashore” - Kipling

      Danny Marks was born in 1925 in Malta and grew up against the backdrop of Grand Harbour, home of our pre-war Mediterranean Fleet in its high noon of bone-white teak and gleaming brightwork under sun-bleached awnings, a Navy where a ship was known by her immaculate boats and her Captain would suffer if it took more than eight minutes from the breakwater to the ‘G’ as she secured to her head and stern buoys.

      As a teenager things were different for Danny as Malta starved under a vicious, murderous and relentless aerial assault by first Italy and then Germany. In January 1941, fluent in English, Italian and obviously Maltese, Danny started a civilian apprenticeship in the dockyard, a bomb destined for HMS Illustrious destroying his newly-issued toolkit on his first day at work.
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      'And the show went on' by Alan Riding. 

      by
      old_fat_and_hairy
       Number of Views: 335 
      1. Categories:
      2. History,
      3. Non-Fiction
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      The book is subtitled; ‘cultural life in Nazi-occupied Paris’. Which probably gives a hint as to what it is about.

      In June, 1940, German tanks and assorted troops rolled into Paris, a silent and deserted city. Eight days later, on June 22nd France surrendered and accepted German Occupation. A small consolation was that Paris was virtually undamaged; the City of Light remained as it had been, save for the swastika defacing it’s buildings and monuments, and the swagger of jackboots along the Champs Elysee.

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      Haynes Workshop Manual - 'RMS TITANIC 1909-1912 ('OLYMPIC'-Class)' 

      by
      Subsunk
       Number of Views: 992 
      1. Categories:
      2. History,
      3. Naval,
      4. Non-Fiction
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      Last week I saw a guy under the dashboard of his Nissan Bluebird doing faultfinding with an oily, tattered Haynes manual - not something you see a lot of these days, as all cars seem to be rendered tamper-proof by their makers. This has left Haynes in a bit of a fix, and so they have had to adapt by going for the interest market. This has been a patchy affair, (their book on the Apollo spacecraft being apparently aimed at a very stupid child) and so I had already half-composed the review for 'TITANIC' when it arrived. On reading it, I have had to suck back. It isn't dumbed down, it isn't sentimental and the authors do know what they are talking about. They are both old-school, time-served apprentices (an Admiralty Inspector and a dockyard shipwright) and have the ability - not often found in the engineering world - to make technobabble illuminating and interesting.
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      Berlin at War by Roger Moorhouse 

      by
      Seaweed
       Number of Views: 851 
      1. Categories:
      2. History,
      3. Memoire/Battlefield Memoire,
      4. Non-Fiction
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      This book is an attempt to convey what Berliners were thinking as their world rolled first into war in 1939 and ultimately into disaster in 1945. World and national events are sketched in as background insofar as they affected life in the capital of Greater Germany.

      This is a work in the recent tradition of the populist ‘democratisation’ of history, an approach which always risks trivialising events unless it can show that what the common people think actually influences what happens. Oddly, although the German people were never allowed to interfere in what their leaders were up to, the people’s fears and anxieties did influence Goebbels who recorded his disquiet on many occasions. The book is thus, perhaps, a useful companion work to essentially top-down military history such as Beevor’s ‘Berlin: the Downfall’. It also affords interesting comparisons to the many works which describe people’s experiences on the Home Front in Britain, and in its later chapters particularly will entertain those who can personally recall being put to difficult straits by Germany’s wanton aggression.
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