The Devil's Horseshoe by Gary Best

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Author's Synopsis

Two young crop dusters from the San Joaquin Valley of California are recruited by the air force to fly C-47s during WW II in the China-Burma-India Theater of war. The people they meet and the relationships forged are tested daily by the stress and pressure faced by aviators who fly the twin engine, unprotected, unarmed, glider-towing cargo planes, the Skytrain.

ISBN/ASIN: ISBN: 978-1-55571-886-2
Book Format(s): Soft cover
Genre(s): Historical Fiction
Review Genre: Fiction—Historical Fiction
Number of Pages: 333
Link to Book on Amazon:
http://www.hellgatepress.com
 

Mission of Honor by Jim Crigler

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MWSA Review

Mission of Honor is an amazing memoir that tells a personal story about the author that exposes his flaws, immaturity, relationships, courage, sense of duty, and ultimate redemption. It took me back to the 1960s and 1970s, when our country was fractured by the Vietnam War and, in a concise, economical fashion, it told the history of that time. An underlying theme was that the United States shipped off hundreds of thousands of young people to a war zone with no regard for the changes that would occur in them and no respect for their sacrifices. The author reminds us that these young people returned to a country that more often showed them scorn than honor.
The story takes us on a young man's journey. He goes from being an irresponsible teenager who impregnates two women and does not "do the right thing." He is sent to Vietnam as a helicopter pilot and becomes an American hero. You begin to see him change through that experience, but not enough to gain complete redemption. It isn't until years later that he finds redemption and becomes a man of character.

This had to be an extremely difficult book for Mr. Crigler to write, but the payoff for him in the writing must have been huge. As a reader, I found the book cathartic and renewed my pride in my service in Vietnam.

The only thing that detracted from the reading was the less-than-stellar writing style. It was obvious that the author is not a professional writer. The book had many grammatical errors and poor word choices. But, despite this, I still enjoyed Mission of Honor and highly recommend it.

Review by Joe Badal (March 2018)

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Author's Synopsis

Most of us never get to test ourselves in combat. As UH-1 Helicopter pilot flying in the jungle highlands of South Vietnam, Warrant Officer Jim Crigler and the men he flew with were tested daily. Coming of age in the late 1960s and early 1970s was challenging for most young men of that era. Throw in drugs, free love, draft notices, the Vietnam War and a country deeply divided, and you have one of the most important books of this genre. This true story is a raw, bold, introspective autobiography where the author openly wrestles with his personal moral dilemma to find meaning and purpose in his life. He calls it his "Mission of Honor."
 

ISBN/ASIN: 978-1-784521-08-0
Book Format(s): Soft cover, Kindle
Genre(s): Nonfiction, Memoir, Biography
Review Genre: Nonfiction—Memoir/Biography
Number of Pages: 305

The Assassins by Gayle Lynds

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MWSA Review
 

Review Missing
 

Author's Synopsis

Six master assassins, each a legend in the dark corners of international espionage, banded together to steal a fortune in the midst of a war zone. But the mission went tragically wrong, and they retreated into the shadows―until now…

Former military spy Judd Ryder is walking in his own Washington, D.C. neighborhood when he spots someone coming out the front door of his home―who looks just like him, and is wearing his clothes. Just as Ryder starts to trail him, the imposter is killed in a hit-and-run that’s no accident. Was the man the intended victim, or Ryder himself?
Ryder learns that a link to his double’s murder is an infamous Cold War assassin: Code name, the Carnivore. Two of the last people to see the Carnivore were Ryder and CIA trainee Eva Blake, and someone is using them to lure him out. Now, from D.C. all the way to Baghdad, the league of assassins will wage a final battle―even against one another―in a death match for Saddam Hussein’s long-missing billion-dollar fortune. And Judd and Eva are caught in the crossfire...

Edge of Valor by John Gobbell

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MWSA Review
The story begins on 9 August 1945, a date marking the end of the Japanese Empire and the end of WWII. USS Maxwell (DD 525), flagship of Destroyer Squadron 77 is part of a group of cruisers and destroyers protecting the battleship Iowa, which, after a day of shelling Hitachi, Japan, is withdrawing to the east. What is so important about the date? At 1102 hours Nagasaki, Japan was destroyed by the United States’ second atomic bomb, and Japan was forced to face defeat — but terms of surrender take time to arrange, providing ample opportunities for mischief and intrigue by our ally Joseph Stalin et. al.

As the sun sets on this fateful day, Commander Todd Ingram, the exhausted captain of the Maxwell, and Captain Jeremiah T. (Boom Boom) Landa, the squadron’s commodore, are standing n Maxwell’s bridge watching the sunset. Word of the second atomic bomb has reached the fleet, and everyone is wondering if the war is finally over. 

Joseph Stalin knew Japan has to surrender, and he makes a last minute grab for a piece of the Empire’s pie.

Maxwell’s executive officer, Lieutenant Commander Eldon (Tubby) White, enters the bridge with a message. The Soviet Union has declared war on Japan, invaded Mongolia, and plans to occupy one of the main Japanese islands.

The author weaves a complex tale encompassing the remainder of 1945, starting with events leading up to Japan’s formal surrender. A surrender opposed by elements of the Japanese military because surrendering violated the code of bushido. After the formal surrender, Ingram is sent on a top secret mission without being told its real purpose, and finds himself a pawn in a game between the NKVD and the OSS, with guidance (misguidance?) provided by the State Department. During the mission and afterwards, he encounters Soviet duplicity. In addition to naval action, the tale includes a double agent, two love stories, and lots of intrigue. 

Edge of Valor is a story built around real events and historical facts — Japanese Unit 731 for example. 

Interplay between characters is reminiscent of books authored by W.E.B. Griffin.

Edge of Valor is the fifth novel in the Todd Ingram series, which presents the author with a dilemma—how much of the story already told must be retold? In the case of Edge of Valor, the author thankfully provided a list of names and titles at the front of the book. A list I found very helpful.

This is an excellent, accurate, well-written and plotted historical novel. I highly recommend Edge of Valor.

Reviewed by: Lee Boyland (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

EDGE OF VALOR is the fifth thriller by John J. Gobbell featuring the World War II exploits of Cdr. Todd Ingram, commanding officer of the destroyer USS Maxwell (DD 525) who saves his ship when it is hit by a kamikaze off Okinawa. For repairs, they pull into Kerama Rhetto, Okinawa, where they receive news of the war’s end. 

Ingram expects to be shipped home like the rest of his crew but instead receives orders to fly to Manila, where he is met by Brig. Gen. Otis Dewitt, an Army buddy from his days on Corregidor who is now intelligence aide to Gen. Richard K. Sutherland, chief of staff to General MacArthur. On Ingram’s C-54 are sixteen Japanese senior military and civilian diplomats who meet with Sutherland to discuss formal surrender arrangements. Two days later the terms are settled and Ingram is working with one of the Japanese delegates to ensure that mines laid in Tokyo Bay are neutralized, allowing for safe passage of more than two hundred Allied ships.

While Ingram is promised that he can attend the surrender ceremony on board the USS Missouri (BB 63), DeWitt, in concert with the State Department, has an ulterior motive and sends Ingram to Karafuto (Sakhalin Island, according to Soviet maps) to defuse a Soviet attack on Hokkaido, the northernmost home island of Japan. Ingram’s old adversary, Edward Dezhnev, is the brigade commander responsible for laying siege to a Japanese holdout garrison in Toro, a natural jumping-off place for an attack on Hokkaido.

Also in Toro, DeWitt explains, is Walter Boring, a Red Cross representative holding two crates of overwhelming photographic evidence of Japan’s experiments on live human beings in China. Ingram is expected to return with those crates, but how can he when Boring is being protected by the Japanese garrison in Toro, where Dezhnev and his troops stand ready to overpower them at any moment?

As his shipmates prepare to return to their loved ones, Ingram’s war continues. Three weeks earlier he had been fighting the Japanese, and the Russians were supposed to be friends. Now he doesn’t know whom to trust.

Emmerspitz, 1938 by David Andrew Westwood

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MWSA Review

David Andrew Westwood has written another historical fiction about the impact of war on people in Emmersmitz, 1938.  It is the story of three adventurous young British girls who set out to have an adventure with old family friends in Austria. 

It is a revealing portrait of the changes on society caused by political ambition and war.  The girls find their old friends will not be friends in the future.  Along the way one young lady finds love, loses it, but saves a national Jewish treasure that she didn't even fully comprehend.

It is a good book and highly recommended to lovers of history, especially military history.

Reviewed by: Michael D. Mullins  (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Over the summer of 1938, three spoilt English girls take a trip to Austria to visit the sons of family friends. They hope to recreate the enjoyment of the boys’ visit to Britain two years earlier, but in the intervening two years things have changed, and for the worse. Austria has voted to become part of Germany, a Third Reich run by an ever-increasingly powerful Hitler. 

Even the small Austrian town of Emmerspitz is affected by the spread of Nazism, and it seems that everyone there has their secrets. Without meaning to, the girls discover the darker side of their friends’ lives, and the mountain itself hides the largest secret of all.

Charentin, 1918 by David Andrew Westwood

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MWSA Review

David Andrew Westwood tells a story about a young man who lies about his age to fight for his beliefs and country in World War I.

The story follows him through his youth, made complicated by his physical challenge, with all its ups and downs.

The story melds the impact of war on families, the horrors of "modern warfare" in the first major world war, and the results of the war on those fighting it.

It is emotional, intriguing and well written. I highly recommend this novel for anyone seeking a better understanding of the world's environment and the pain of battle during the period over which World War I occurred.

Reviewed by:Michael D. Mullins

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Author's Synopsis

Arthur Wheatcroft, a hearing-impaired teen who works with his father on New Zealand’s railways, is content to sit out the war in the belief that he is not wanted. But his experience with trains is needed at the front, and he is recruited to train in England as an officer in the Royal Engineers.

In a town on the River Somme in France, schoolteacher and widow Anneliese Palyart is preparing to evacuate her frightened pupils to a small village away from the fighting. She has lost not only her husband to the war but also her will to live, and she holds no real hope that they will survive.

Meanwhile, General Major of German artillery Ernst Fleischer has been in the forefront of attacks across Belgium, and now it is France’s turn to face his cannon’s wrath. He intends to annihilate anything that stands in the way of his armor and his ambition.

All three are destined to meet on the latest battlefield: Charentin. But why is Arthur found wearing a German uniform and denied a British military burial?

Yankee in Atlanta by Jocelyn Green

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MWSA Review

In Yankee in Atlanta, author Jocelyn Green has given uIn Yankee s another fascinating look at life, death, and love during the American Civil War. This third book in Green’s Heroines Behind the Lines: Civil War series is a must read for those who enjoy historical fiction and romance.  The author’s heroin is indeed a Yankee trapped in Atlanta during the waning days of the Civil War. With Sherman on the steps of Atlanta, scarce food throughout the city, and suspicious eyes everywhere, Jocelyn Green has staged a setting that can’t help but grab the reader’s attention.  I found this book enjoyable, and I found myself cheering for the “good guys” as the book reached its climax.  If you want to know who those good guys are, read the book.  I recommend it!

Reviewed by: Bob Doerr (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

When soldier Caitlin McKae woke up in Atlanta after being wounded in battle, the Georgian doctor who treated her believed Caitlin's only secret was that she had been fighting for the Confederacy disguised as a man. In order to avoid arrest or worse, Caitlin hides her true identity and makes a new life for herself in Atlanta.

Pass in Review: Country by Brian Utermahlen

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MWSA Review

A fascinating novel that reveals tenacious dedication to country in the midst of personal and political chaos during the Vietnam War. Excellent development of characters and places, written by a West Point graduate and Vietnam Combat Veteran.  The author does a splendid job of mixing the complex Vietnam War era issues together, both at war and home, to create a page turning stew.  He craftily ties in three generations of family military service to America with romances lost and found due to circumstances faced.  This third book in the author's series gives the impression you are "there" -  whether in a Senate hearing chaired by a powerful tyrant, in a violent fire-fight, or with family and loved ones during the socially conflicting 70's.  Scenes written were deeply believable ... and, as the author admits, were meant to mesh fact and fiction together.  An excellent, highly recommended read for anyone desiring a view of American history on a touching level!

Reviewed by: Hodge Wood (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Two brothers - one a helicopter pilot, the other an infantry soldier - and a gutsy, dedicated nurse bring to life the real story of Vietnam that the news media, protestors, politicians and the public never saw or understood.

COUNTRY takes you into the cockpit of the workhorse Huey helicopter to fly with Brad Nolan on combat assaults into hot Landing Zones, medical evacuations and night fire support missions.

COUNTRY puts you on combat patrol with Glenn Nolan, on an American firebase being overrun and in the middle of firefights with North Vietnamese regulars in the jungles of Vietnam and Cambodia.

And COUNTRY also puts you inside the trauma-laden operating rooms of American Surgical hospitals with Jenny Kolarik and her nurses as they fight for the life of every wounded soldier.

Pass in Review - COUNTRY is the third and final book of a three generational saga about the Nolans, a twentieth century military family. This is the story of a family, a nation, an Army and the institution of West Point struggling with challenges to the concept of Duty-Honor-Country during the Vietnam era.

Throughout this series, the fictional Nolan family interacts with actual historical characters including Douglas MacArthur, Dwight Eisenhower, Charles Lindbergh, FDR, Winston Churchill, JFK, Lyndon Johnson, and many others.

Book 1 (DUTY) is about the patriarch - Dave Nolan and covers the period from just before America's entry into World War I until the late 1930s. Pass in Review - DUTY won the 2012 Military Writers Society of America Bronze Award for best Historical Fiction.

Book 2 (HONOR) continues where DUTY left off. The book chronicles the story of both Dave Nolan and his son, Mitch, who is a fighter pilot in Europe during WWII. HONOR received the 2013 Military Writers Society Silver Award for Historical Fiction.

The final book of this trilogy brings to conclusion this saga and finally reconciles many of the personal and professional issues of family and service to country begun in the very first chapter of DUTY. Yet questions still linger about the future of the family, the country and the Academy.

Read the series and enjoy the ride.

Secret Assault by Don Helin

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MWSA Review

All the superlative clichés  used in describing extraordinary thrillers are applicable to “Secret Assault” – action packed, exciting, spellbinding, suspenseful, infighting -- just to list a few. Well written, this military thriller kept me up well into the night because I couldn’t put it down until its end.  The characters are well defined and realistic.

Author Don Helin, an Army veteran with years of service in the Pentagon, captures the reader from the start as he describes the shooting of the National Security Adviser, a retiring four-star general, at a Washington area hotel. The general’s protégé, Army Colonel Zack Kelly chases the shooter, a Vietnamese man who is killed in traffic as he tries to escape. Kelly soon learns that several other retired generals and two retired sergeants major has been assassinated or are targeted. A common thread connecting the victims is service with the Americal Division in Vietnam about the time of the My Lai massacre.   

Although working in the nation’s capital, Kelly’s military background includes extensive special operations service, which enhances his ability to rapidly adjust to the face-paced, white knuckled events threatening Vietnam veterans.

As Army, FBI and Washington area police investigators search for the assassins, personal tragedy hits Kelly in an unrelated situation. An old nemesis kidnaps Kelly’s daughter as a ploy to make the colonel suffer a horrific fate for ruining the kidnapper’s career and putting him in prison.

“Secret Assault” is a sequel to Helin’s acclaimed “Devil’s Den” published in 2013.

Reviewed by: Joe Epley (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

 The President's National Security Advisor, General Aaron Hightower, is leaving his retirement party when he is gunned down by a Vietnamese assassin. Colonel Zack Kelly gives chase, but the shooter is hit by a truck and killed. Zack and his partner, Rene Garcia, determine that Hightower is the sixth military leader attacked in the past four months. They investigate the chilling possibility the shootings are part of a plot against the government. Things are not as they seem, however. After two more army retirees are murdered, Zack's world is rocked by an event so traumatic; the hunt for the killers turns deadly personal

Evil Deeds by Joseph Badal

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MWSA Review

Two families struggle to overcome events that start 28 years earlier when a two-year-old child is kidnapped and the child’s father kills the kidnapper’s son. In four parts with three primarily set in the former Yugoslavia during the bloody 1999 ethnic conflict.

Suspense, tension, and excitement are Evil Deeds main elements. Additional characteristics are adrenalin-pumping, gritty, rousing, and fast-paced plot with international political intrigue and terrorism.

Obviously well-researched, with details lending themselves to an authoritative voice that makes the entire tale believable. Behaviors of a number of characters are exactly what you would expect from a real-life version of that character. The author uses the book to illustrate the brutality of the ethnic-cleansing type of brutality that may not have been reported in the press or read by the average media consumer.

The reader’s feelings are successfully manipulated by the author to direct a visceral reaction to words on paper. We anticipate actions and are heartened by actions to bring the “bad guys” to justice. High levels of anxiety make this a page-turner of break-neck pace. There is large-scale villainy to include the office of the president of Yugoslavia. There is espionage and government conspiracy. The main characters face death. Initially the forces of evil are more powerful than those of good. There is a quest for justice and morality that cannot be abandoned by either side.

A mystery is known to the reader and some but not to one of the most significant characters. The reader can “hear” an action sound track that would accompany the prose. The main characters on the side of good are represented as innocents in a corrupt world. The main characters on the side of good are dragged into situations for which they are not prepared or equipped. Some very nice twists to the plot with unexpected changes in direction. One of those is a foreign assassin operating inside U.S. borders. Recommended for readers, who enjoy this genre.

Reviewed by: Jim Tritten (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Evil Deeds is an 118,100-word, four-part thriller spanning a twenty-eight-year period. 
Part I begins in 1971 in Greece with the kidnapping of Bob and Liz Danforth’s two-year-old son, Michael, by a renegade band of Gypsies led by Stefan Radko. Radko and his group kidnap children, spirit them north, and sell them to the Bulgarian Government. The Bulgarians raise the children as Greeks, indoctrinate them as Communists, and train the best and brightest as espionage agents. Years later, these children will be infiltrated back into Greece as Communist agents. Michael’s abduction sets in motion a search by Bob and Liz, in partnership with an U.S. Intelligence Officer, Franklin Meers, and a former Communist agent, George Makris. George was kidnapped at the age of six, raised in the same Bulgarian orphanage Michael is taken to, infiltrated back into Greece twenty-five years later, and arrested by the Greeks as a spy. Bob and George illegally cross into Bulgaria to try to find Michael in the orphanage. Instead, they find the building recently evacuated. While they search the building, Radko and his teenaged son, Gregorie, show up with another kidnapped infant. A gun battle ensues and Bob kills Radko’s son. Radko wounds Bob and George, then escapes. Bob and George rescue the infant and struggle to return to Greece. While Bob and George flee Bulgaria, an alert U.S Embassy employee spots Michael with a woman in a park in Sofia, Bulgaria. Michael is returned to his parents. Bob’s unauthorized excursion into Bulgaria lands him in hot water with the Army. The CIA recruits Bob after he is forced to resign from the military.

Hellbound by Chester D. Campbell

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MWSA Review

Hellbound, is a thrilling and well woven story, intricate in its blending of mafia bad guys and everyday elderly people on a church bus tour.

Vignettes of the lives of individuals on the bus, both known and hidden, are brought to us mixed in with the unknown to the passenger’s drama, played out slowly over the course of the tour. Campbell, keeps us on the edge of our seats as the relentless pursuit by the mafia of the central character Bryce Reynolds (Pat Pagano) reaches a conclusion. 

The ending will surprise the reader. A great story, that I can see as a made for TV movie that will hold an audience’s attention..

Reviewed by: jim greenwald (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

The story takes place in 1999. When a busload of seniors from a suburban Nashville church head down the Natchez Trace on a carefree journey to The Big Easy, they are unaware that a Mafia hit squad is playing a deadly game of tag with them. All except one passenger. The man they know as Bryce Reynolds is really Pat Pagano, a Medal of Honor winner from World War II and a successful Las Vegas stockbroker who was lured into handling investments for a New York crime family.

After his two grown sons are killed in an attack by a rival gang and his wife succumbs to cancer, Pagano decimates the mob with his testimony in federal court. He disappears, and then resurfaces in Nashville as Reynolds, a retired businessman from Oklahoma. But after years of searching, an old Mafia capo tracks Pagano to the church bus enroute to New Orleans. 

Murder in the Slaughterhouse by Tom Crowley

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MWSA Review

The murder of a boy and the visual it relates combined with friendship finds Matt Chance drawn into the search for the truth of why this boy was so brutally murdered.

Mysterious Bangkok, Thailand adds to the drama of Matt's search and leads him in directions he could not have forseen. Al-Qaeda, the CIA and intelligence services in Thailand all add to the story Tom Crowley has written in "Murder in the Slaughterhouse."

From the slums of Bangkok to Washington DC Matt searches for the truth and for the help he needs in finding the answer he has promised to a friend. Placing his own life in danger he moves in the circles of drug trafficer, terrorists, and the CIA agent gone bad.

The answers and the end result are not expected, the reader will keep turning the pages to find out the who, what, when, and where. A good read.

Reviewed by: jim greenwald (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

A homeless teenage boy is found murdered in a Bangkok slum slaughterhouse where they kill the pigs. Afraid that the police will not give their full attention to the murder, a social worker calls on former U.S. Army Ranger Matt Chance to help find the killer. 

What Matt finds leads him first to the world of human traffickers, and then to those who have reason to protect the traffickers and want Matt’s investigation stopped. As Matt starts to uncover ties between the traffickers and the international terrorist organization Al-Qaeda and the CIA, he becomes the target of those who want the investigation dropped and finds himself fighting for his life.

Johnnie Come Lately by Kathleen M. Rodgers

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MWSA Review

A series of unfortunate traumas, family secrets, and maternal rejection propel the protagonist, Johnnie Kitchen, on a journey of healing through self-discovery and truth, in Kathleen M. Rodger's Johnnie Come Lately. 

Abandoned by her mother, and blaming herself for the turmoil in her life, Johnnie Kitchen seeks to find love, forgiveness, and acceptance, not only from her family members, but mostly from Johnnie, herself. 

Kathleen hooks the reader in the first passage, and doesn't let go until the last page is turned.  The author builds on layers of interactions and deceits, to reveal a carefully woven tapestry of mystery in Johnnie Come Lately. Her plausible course of events lends credibility to the plot; her characters are real, flawed, and likable, which adds authenticity to her tale. The reader becomes entangled, unable turn away, as the pieces of Johnnie's puzzle fall into place.

Johnnie Come Lately takes the reader on a passionate rollercoaster of redemption through brute honesty. The telling is full of raw emotion which touches the reader through myriad sensations. I found myself crying, amused, animated, and angered... and full of anticipation. I look forward to reading Kathleen M. Rodger's next book.

Reviewed by: Sandra Linhart (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Would life have been different for Johnnie if she’d been named after a woman rather than her dead uncle? Or if her mama hadn’t been quite so beautiful or flighty? The grandparents who raised her were loving, but they didn’t understand the turmoil roiling within her. And they had so many, many secrets. Why did her mama leave? Would she ever return? How did her Uncle Johnny really die? Who was her father? 

Now Johnnie Kitchen is a 43-year-old woman with three beautiful children, two of them grown. She has a handsome, hardworking husband who adores her, and they live in the historic North Texas town of Portion in a charming bungalow. But she never finished college and her only creative outlet is a journal of letters addressed to both the living and the dead. Although she has conquered the bulimia that almost killed her, Johnnie can never let down her guard, lest the old demons return. Or perhaps they never went away to begin with. For Johnnie has secrets of her own, and her worst fear is that the life she’s always wanted—the one where she gets to pursue her own dreams—will never begin. 

Not until her ghosts reveal themselves.

Young Soldiers Amazing Warriors by Robert H. Sholley

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MWSA Review

I was honored to have actually held this book in my hands and to have been able to read about such heroic young men in battles long forgotten by the world at large. "Young Soldiers - Amazing Warriors" by Col. Robert Sholly is a book that future generations will read and wonder if these men really ever existed. Thank God for such men who sacrificed so much of their own lives and youth for a cause bigger than themselves. Actually, they were truly there for each other as brothers in battle. The author, I think, under tells the story without embellishments that most of us old veterans seem to add to our old glory stories about the war. You get the feeling that he is just telling you of how it was. But what a history to share, and what stories of such young warriors.

There are not many books about the Vietnam War that surprise me or generate the emotional connections that this book brought to me. I have read over 200 books related to the Vietnam War and most of those were memoirs or history books. This is by far one of the best of the group. One gets the feeling that it is the heroic history of the 4th Infantry Division itself that enriches the reading experience - after all, these young men needed nothing more than a narration of what happened. However, I was impressed with the author's ability not to get in the way of the stories themselves. He tells it in a style and manner that honors it.

I am a Vietnam Veteran and an author as well, so for me to impressed with another book on the Vietnam War means it had to be special and above the rest. This was! This is a FIVE STAR BOOK on any rating chart! I fully endorse it and recommend it for anyone who enjoys reading history, or reading about heroes!

Reviewed by: Bill McDonald (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Book covers the first year of combat for the 1st Battalion, 8th Infantry of the 4th Infantry Division (1966-67). The narrative follows the author's daily journals and is augmented by descriptions of events by his men from their differing perspectives. It describes the harsh environmental conditions in which infantrymen had to live even before they confronted their first enemy. The combat scenes are tragic and brutal. Time and again, men knowingly sacrificed their lives to save their friends. The combat tempo was such that in a 60-day period there were four Medals of Honor and five Distinguished Service Crosses awarded to men of the battalion for their bravery and valor. The book was written to help educate the American public what their soldiers experience when the country sends them to war, no matter where or when they fight.

Silent Invaders: Combat Gliders of the Second World War by Gary Best

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MWSA Review

This is a fine book by author Gary Best, which provides a good overview of glider attacks launched by both the Allies and the Axis. 

Best, the author of previous World War II books uses material from previous publications and some new materials and interviews with veterans from the war, to examine the strengths – and weaknesses – of using lightweight, engineless aircraft to launch surprise attacks on enemy installations.  After some short chapters describing the development of the gliders used by Germany, Britain, and the United States, Best looks at the training of the glider pilots, tow-aircraft pilots and the men who rode these delicate craft into combat.  Best then examines the major missions in which gliders were used. 

These chapters include the better-known missions like the German assault on the Belgian Eben Emael fortress, the bloody attack on British installations in Crete, and the Allied mass-drops at D-Day and in Operation Market Garden.  He also summarizes lesser-known uses of Gliders in brief accounts of Burma in 1943, the German rescue of Benito Mussolini in northern Italy, and the commando attack on German nuclear research facilities in Norway. There is even a small section on what is known about glider use by Japanese and Russian forces. These accounts are enhanced by very good use of first-hand memories of participants.  In all, this slim volume gives the reader a very fine succinct account of the glider’s role in the war.

Gliders were, admittedly, very dangerous, especially in the early training of the pilots.  As one veteran noted after the war, “I am sure we lost more pilots in death glide training . . . than we ever did in combat.”  This proved markedly true in night drops; the number of men lost crashing into trees or wetlands during the D-Day assault has never been fully tabulated.  Even in the daylight landings for Market Garden, British glider troop losses on the first day contributed to the failure to hold the last, vital bridge at Arnhem.  The anguish of that is very clear in the book’s first-hand accounts by the participants.

The combination of background on the development of gliders and the number of examples on their use in the war make this a most useful and impressive book.

Reviewed by: Terry Shoptaugh (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Silent Invaders is a book about the men who piloted gliders and those who flew in them. To the extent possible it is written in a continuous narrative, often combining first person accounts from more than one person so that those experiences will have multiple perspectives of the same scene, battle, flight, landing, and related experiences. Unit names, flight and squadron numbers and other identifiers are, for the most part, not identified, outside of a larger descriptive framework so that one is able to concentrate on what an individual saw, heard, felt, or accomplished.

Project Management in History: The First Jeep by Paul Bruno

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MWSA Review

In Project Management in History: The First Jeep Bruno presents a detailed, technical manual on the people, history, policies, nuts and bolts that evolved to ultimately create the jeep that became famous in WWII. 

With roots of the story beginning before WWI, this jeep evolution is well documented with all the players and places that contributed to the final product that went into play in 1941.  With Roadster beginnings, the jeep ultimate replaced the mule as the Army’s light vehicle of choice, and the author writes to the entrepreneur so that they can taste the flavor of the management/development process.  Sharp historical pictures and illustrations are featured, and everything is foot noted, referenced, and indexed.  Recommended for the student who likes to dig deeply and learn all the facts.

Reviewed by: Hodge Wood (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

The spring and summer of 1940 witnessed the resounding defeats of the French army and British Expeditionary Force at the hands of modernized German troops, designed to take advantage of the latest advances in technology. These included mobile vehicles and tanks used in formation to blast through enemy lines, as well as combined ground and air tactics. The evacuation of the British from Dunkirk and the final defeat of their French allies in June 1940 left only a thin line of English fighter planes between that island nation and total defeat.

Meanwhile, leaders of the United States Army, decimated by demobilization after World War I and budget cuts during the Great Depression, knew they were completely unprepared for this new type of mobile warfare called “blitzkrieg,” a German term meaning “lightning war.” Though experts in the U.S. Army had worked from the end of World War I to develop a combination light weapons carrier and command and reconnaissance vehicle, no perfect model had yet been developed by 1940. In June of that same year, the Army compiled a list of requirements for a revolutionary new truck to replace the mule as the Army’s primary method of moving troops and small payloads.

“Project Management in History: The First Jeep” tells the story of the American Bantam Car Company, which dared to meet the challenge to build the prototype in the impossible timeframe of 49 days. The “¼ ton truck 4×4 light project,” as the effort was titled by the Army, represents a textbook case of entrepreneurship and project management that holds lessons for today’s business leaders and project managers. Contemporary leaders face a similar environment of rapidly changing technology, volatile economic circumstances and turbulent international relations, forces that assailed the U.S. Army throughout the interwar period.

The Man Called Brown Condor by Thomas E. Simmons

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MWSA Review
 

Review Missing
 

Author's Synopsis

In this gripping, never-before-told tale, biographer Thomas E. Simmons brings to life the true story of John C. Robinson, who rose from fraught and humble beginnings as a black child in segregated Mississippi to outstanding success. He became a pilot and an expert in building and assembling his own working aircraft; he also helped to establish a school of aviation at the Tuskegee Institute (there would have been no Tuskegee Airmen without him), and his courageous wartime service in Ethiopia during the Italian invasion in 1935 won him international fame.

During Robinson’s service to Ethiopia, he took to the air to combat the first Fascist invasion of what would become World War II. This remarkable hero may have been the first American to oppose Fascism in combat. When Ethiopia was freed by British troops during World War II, Haile Selassie asked Robinson to return to Ethiopia to help reestablish the Ethiopian Air Force. For Robinson and the five men he picked to go with him, just getting to Ethiopia in wartime 1944 was an adventure in and of itself.

Featuring thirty-five black-and-white photographs and based on twenty-three years’ worth of original research when very little information on this remarkable American hero was available, The Man Called Brown Condor is more than just a biography of an unfairly forgotten African American pilot; this book provides insight on racial conditions in the first half of the twentieth century and illustrates the political intrigue within a League of Nations afraid to face the rise of Fascism.

Skyhorse Publishing, along with our Arcade, Good Books, Sports Publishing, and Yucca imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of biographies, autobiographies, and memoirs. Our list includes biographies on well-known historical figures like Benjamin Franklin, Nelson Mandela, and Alexander Graham Bell, as well as villains from history, such as Heinrich Himmler, John Wayne Gacy, and O. J. Simpson. We have also published survivor stories of World War II, memoirs about overcoming adversity, first-hand tales of adventure, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

Oveta Culp Hobby: Colonel, Cabinet Member, Philanthropist by Debra L. Winegarten

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MWSA Review

Today it might be somewhat taken for granted but, when Oveta Culp Hobby was growing up it simply never happened. Well, rarely if ever!

Being first or different was not her goal in life. She was achievement driven in a time period where women stayed home, they simply did not place themselves in the realm of a “man’s world.”

Firsts were a norm for her! She was the first head of the Women’s Army Corp, the first Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare (appointed by Dwight Eisenhower). Only one other woman had served in a cabinet post prior to her.

Far too many books are written that miss the mark when it comes to encouraging women to do and be more. Debra Winegarten in “Oveta Culp Hobby: Colonel, Cabinet Member, Philanthropist” has written a guide for women to follow and Oveta Culp Hobby is clearly an example worth emulating. More than a biography it will encourage the reader to not see obstacles but rather opportunities.

Her positive approach too, and life long quest for learning is a clear road map for all young women. Victimhood is a poor substitute for desire and effort, Ovita Culp Hobby showed the way with a continuing display of accomplishment.    

Reviewed by: jim greenwald (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Oveta Culp Hobby (1905–1995) had a lifetime of stellar achievement. During World War II, she was asked to build a women’s army from scratch—and did. Hobby became Director of the Women’s Army Corps and the first Army woman to earn the rank of colonel. President Eisenhower chose her as Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, making her the second woman in history to be appointed to a president’s cabinet. When she wasn’t serving in the government, Hobby worked with her husband, former Texas governor William P. Hobby, to lead a media empire that included the Houston Post newspaper and radio and TV stations. She also supported the Houston community in many ways, from advocating for civil rights for African Americans to donating generously to the Houston Symphony and the Museum of Fine Arts.

Oveta Culp Hobby is the first biography of this important woman. Written for middle school readers, it traces her life from her childhood in Killeen to her remarkable achievements in Washington, DC, and Houston. Debra Winegarten provides the background to help young adult readers understand the times in which Hobby lived and the challenges she faced as a woman in nontraditional jobs. She shows how Hobby opened doors for women to serve in the military and in other professions that still benefit women today. Most of all, Oveta Culp Hobby will inspire young adults to follow their own dreams and turn them into tangible reality.

Guardian of Guadalcanal by Gary Williams

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MWSA Review

Author Gary Williams brings us a true American war hero in his World War II Story of Douglas a. Munro.

The book is appropriately titled Guardian of Guadalcanal.  The account of Munro's heroic actions during the battle for Guadalcanal made it very clear to me why the Marine Corps., to this day, has so much respect for this former member of the U.S. Coast Guard.  

It's easy to see that the author extensively researched both Munro's life and the combat on Guadalcanal.  Once the reseach was done, Williams did a very good job in presenting us that story along with dozens of photos, award citations, and maps.  If you like reading about American war heroes, this story of Douglas Munro, the Guardian of Guadalcanal, should definitely be up high on your list!

Reviewed by: Bob Doerr (Feb 2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Guardian of Guadalcanal is the World War II biographical account of Petty Officer Douglas a. Munro, United States Coast Guard, the Coast Guards only Medal of Honor recipient.

Sailor Man by Del Staecker

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MWSA Review

Using letters from J.P. Nunnally written long after World War II ended, the author tells an emotionally packed first-person story of a young man barely 16 years old who joined the Navy illegally. An example is in one of his first letters to his estranged son. He wrote:

“The gods of death, hell, and destruction must have had a heyday on D-day at Saipan. But the worst was yet to come from their emissaries – the green blow flies feasting off of almost 2,000 bodies floating in the water.”

Nunnally vividly describes his death-defying experiences as a coxswain piloting a landing craft that carried marines, soldiers and supplies on numerous invasions in the Pacific theatre,including Saipan, Tinian, Peleliu and Okinawa. By the time he was seventeen, he was a seasoned veteran. By the time he was nineteen, he was an alcoholic.

After the war, Nunnally came home, married, had a son and then dropped out of their life.Clearly, Nunnally suffered Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, but PTSD was not known back then. After forty years estrangement, the son reconciled with his father asked Nunnally to write about his experiences in the war aboard the USS Fuller.

The series of letters make up the bulk of “Sailor Man – The Troubled Life and Times of J.P. Nunnally, USN.” Some describing the violence of war in gory detail, some recounting whimsical search for booze, some in portraying the bravery of men charging into a horrific rain of gunfire and aerial bombardment day in-day out.

Author Del Staecker uses photos, maps, excerpts from official reports of the USS Fuller, and interviews withFuller crew members to add perspective and clarity to Nunnally’s narratives.

“Sailor Man” makes one cringe, cry, and laugh. It gives the reader a greater appreciation for the sailor, Marines and soldiers who weathered deadly maelstroms of destruction in taking fortified Pacific Islands needed to win the world’s greatest war. Most of all, if helps the reader understand how the trauma of war shattered the life of a brave young man long after the conflict is over.

Reviewed by: Joe Epley (2015)

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Author's Synopsis

Sailor Man is the illuminating account of James Preston Nunnally, told through letters he wrote to his adult son. J.P. was a teenager who lied about his age to enlist in the Navy, endured combat service in World War Two's Pacific Theater, and returned home. What sets Sailor Man apart, making it an invaluable addition to the canon of World War Two, is that it also reveals the lesser known dark side--the psychological trauma so many of these brave young men experienced as a result of their repeated encounters with the horror of war--what we now call (PTSD) Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. This book describes the personal cost of war paid by one man and his family, and it will break your heart--especially if you are a child of a combat veteran.