I don't know if these books are translated - but those are masterpieces:

series of Artem Drabkin books with interviews of veterans ("T-34 in action" is translated and is present on amazon as kindle edition)

All these books names are beginning with " Ya dralsya na ..." (I fought in a ...) and then a name of combat arm : artillery, fighter planes, bombers, Il-2's, tanks and so on...

The other great source for first-hand memories is Drabkin's project iremember.ru - maybe it might be even more useful for those who don't speak russian. There are hundreds of recollections all sorted by combat arms. You can use google translate (with care of course ;-)

PS. iremember.ru HAS English version! Didn't notice a small icon in the corner :-) So please don't use google translate on that ;-)
This site is absolutely "must read" for anyone interested in first-hand memories from Soviet side WWII Eastern Front. Those grannies aren't bound these days with secrets or ideology they just tell their stories and you can see everybody had different experience - that makes it very valuable.

Best Regards!

American supplies and sacrificing a tremendous amount of people got you to Berlin.
Nothing else.

So overstating the importance of Lend Lease and the Soviet irrecoverable losses? I see. I guess Soviet army fighting better on the operational level by the 3rd period of the war has nothing to do with it. I suggest reading this though:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.co...u&client=opera
(not even Russian)

That article should be interesting to the OP (and contributors to this thread), as it provides the overview for the development of the Eastern Front histories and criticism of a number of historical works.

What a goldmine of information! Thanks.

I'll have a read of that soon, I'm a bit brain dead tonight :doh:

My favorite is "The Forgotten Soldier" by Guy Sajer.
Read it numerous times


http://www.amazon.com/The-Forgotten-.../dp/1574882864

Excellent First person account

The Journey
 

I read a book years ago about a desperate escape from a post-war soviet prison camp and the subsequent journey (during which, in this true story, the escapees even believe they encountered a Yeti.) I was sure the book was called The Journey, and that a film of it had recently been made. Clearly I was mistaken, for when I search for this title, all I get is the rather cheesy-looking film below.

http://i.imgur.com/P4bTMCu.png?1


Does anyone know what the book/film title is? It's a great PoW yarn, if nothing else...

The book you are thinking of was likely The Long Walk (1956), the memoir by former Polish POW Sławomir Rawicz, who escaped from a Soviet Gulag and walked 4,000 miles to freedom in World War II.

http://i.ebayimg.com/00/s/MTYwMFgxMT...Sy3Qi/$_35.JPG

A movie based on it starring Ed Harris and directed by Peter Weir called The Way Back was made in 2010.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Way_Back

That's the one! That's it! Thanks everso, pal: I'd like to see that...

I found the dvd last week and we watched it on Saturday. Great film (Colin Farrell is in it, too) but there was no encounter with the Yeti.

I would recommend Willi Heinrich's trilogy: Cross of Iron, Crack of Doom and Mark of Shame. Although these are fiction works they give an insight into the life of a German soldier.
You might also want to look at David Robbins War Of the Rats (Stalingrad) and his novel on the Kursk battle.