What are you reading right now?

[Task Force]

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

I reported some months ago that I was reading Morison's The European Discovery Of America. I got all my stuff out of storage last week, and discovered that I actually own a copy!:rotfl:

Purchased it at a library sale several years ago, and forgot I even had it.

@ TF: The Two-Ocean War is a (very) condensed version of Morison's History Of United States Naval Operations In World War Two. If you ever have the money, and the inclination, I highly recommend it.

Il look for that one. There is a book store around here with good prices. I got the two ocean war for 15$ and the encylopedia of military aircraft for 20$ two years ago.

[Sailor Steve]

Be forewarned: The full set is 15 volumes.

Originally Posted by Sockeye

Currently on "The Long Goodbye" by Raymond Chandler, starring private d!ck Phillip Marlowe. A bit of a slow go up to the point I'm at now (100 or so pages), but I really only have time to read a chapter at a time, being interrupted by the crap of the day; overall, it's keeping my interest. It's been years since I've read Chandler, so it's great to be back chasing down leads.

A couple of years ago I had time to read the collected Raymond Chandler. The version I read had the short stories that he had pulled from publication, as they were later incorporated into his novels. Reading them was fun, because you really can see what he changed and what he didn't. The other shorts are mostly fun too, especially Red Wind.

I also read his predecessor, Dashiell Hammett, author of The Maltese Falcon and The Thin Man. His short stories are also quite good.

[Sailor Steve]

I've just started I Love Paul Revere, Whether He Rode or Not, buy Richard Shenkman. It's a sequel to his Legends, Lies & Cherished Myths of American History, which I have yet to read. Both are examinations of the myths that surround history.

This one has a chapter titled 'Patriotism', which looks closely at the history of the American Flag, and modern Flag worship. He cites the Congressional Record in showing that the only reason Congress approved a National Flag at all was that all naval ships of other countries carried one, and shouldn't ours too? Congress voted on it quickly to clear the table for "more important matters". Benjamin Franklin and John Adams co-wrote a letter in which they described the Flag as "thirteen stripes, alternately red, white and blue." Also, it's now pretty certain that no army unit of any type carried the US Flag during the Revolution. Paintings that show them thus were all made at least forty years later.

There are other great chapters on the history of Religion in America, as well as the Work Ethic (Pretty much all strikes in the 1800s were over shorter work days, and yet we praise the hard work of our ancestors), Business ('Evil War Profiteers' funded the Revolution, and while the more conservative among us insist that it was the Second World War, and not the New Deal, that saved us from the Great Depression, it was still massive government spending during the War that accomplished that), and several more I haven't gotten to yet.

All-in-all a fun little book. I'm going to be looking for the first one.

[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by Sockeye

No, not yet, but I figure I'll be getting "The Big Nowhere" and "White Jazz" at some point. Might as well have the trio, right?

"The Black Dahlia" I'm not so sure if I'm really interested; saw the crappy (IMHO) movie, and have seen a few documentaries including an especially creepy Elroy one, and think I have the gist. So I dunno, a maybe/maybe not thing for me.

Yes, the movie was crappy but it was the first in the L.A. Quartet series. The book is much better and the actual crime is more or less a plot device that motivates the characters. I'd recommend it. It's also neat to read it and compare it to his recent stuff like American Tabloid or Cold Six Thousand, or even later works in the L.A. series like L.A. Confidential to see Ellroy develop his style.

[mookiemookie]

I'm currently working my way through Clavell's Shogun. I almost need to read it with a pen and paper next to me to keep all the characters and plots straight. Great book so far though.

[She-Wolf]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

I'm currently working my way through Clavell's Shogun. I almost need to read it with a pen and paper next to me to keep all the characters and plots straight. Great book so far though.

isn't that the one where one of the crew gets boiled in oil? Horrible description, poor man, but, yes, as you say, bloomin good book.

[wireman]

Just finished:

A Sailor in Steam by J. Murray Lindsay

Gatchina Days: Reminiscences of a Russian Pilot by Alexander Riaboff

Cuckoo Over Vienna by Claude L. Porter

[HunterICX]

From D-Day to Berlin by Stephen Ambrose

HunterICX

[ENEMY BELOW]

Re-reading Red Storm Rising Because Amidst My Many Underway History,
Biography And Philosophy Books I Needed A Good Old Winter Time Tom Clancy Potboiler.that's The Only Bummer About The Demise Of The Cold War Era,tom Clancy Almost Out Of Work.his Books Since The Cardinal Of The Kremlin Are Just Not As Flippin Riveting.

[FIREWALL]

U-BOAT ACE The Wolfgang Luth Story for the 6th time. I get more out of it everytime I read it.

[RealJambo]

Originally Posted by FIREWALL

U-BOAT ACE The Wolfgang Luth Story for the 6th time. I get more out of it everytime I read it.

My favourite Kaleun, and also one of my favourite books. I reccommend it to anyone

[Sailor Steve]

Just finished The First Civilisations, by Glyn Daniel, 1968. It's a study of the earliest know civilizations, and the archeologists who explored them, and their differing opinions on who influenced whom and what it all means.

Just started Mary Tudor, by David Loades, a biography of Elizabeth I's older sister (AKA 'Bloody Mary') and her reign as England's first queen.

[Grizzybear]

I just returned from a Milwaukee trip and spent about a week down there. Well in short I was bored and I remembered the library i grew up near had some awesome sub and war books. So off I went...
Read-
Silent Service..an oldie but a goodie. I was astounded in the malfunctions of the torpedos and the number of skippers getting canned..yikes glad SH4 is not as mean as them.
Also picked up and scanned thru these..
Uboats under the swatztika..good refrerence for the uboat side of things.
Also another ..time life book I think..forgot what is was called. Lots of pics and diagram of standard fleet boat.
Overall a good reading week...Now Iam back to my twilight 2000 idea generation and iam reading Slow Dance in the killing ground.
Rich

[Sailor Steve]

Just finished Mary Tudor. A fascinating book, it shows why a woman widely respected and liked during her own lifetime has become regarded as one of England's worst monarchs ever. An honest biography, with a lot of notes referring mainly to contemporary papers and letters, David Loades shows what Mary experienced as the daughter of Henry VIII, including her father putting her mother and her aside, being declared a bastard, having to renounce her faith just to stay alive during the short time her brother was King Edward VI, having her brother's will renounce their father's and name a cousin, Jane Grey, as his heir, being the political pawn in an ongoing series of marriage contracts with princes all over Europe, and finally becoming England's first Queen, in a society that dictated that if she married her husband would rule both her and the nation.

When she did marry, it was Prince Philip, son of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and soon to be Spain's King Philip II. Philip was both liked and disliked in England, but he did his best to win over the people, and Mary's council stipulated as part of the marriage contract that Philip would have no power in England, but any son of the union would become king as soon as possible. Philip was unhappy, being married to a woman who was described as "both not attractive and not frigid." He spent as much time as possible away from England, and Mary suffered through what everyone thought was a pregnancy but now seems to have been a benign tumor, and had to face the shame of preparing the palace for a child that never seemed to come.

Mary was also a devout Catholic in a Protestant country, and her efforts to assuage her people only resulted in the Pope considering her a "quasi-heretic". Her efforts to please the Pope created animosity among the people, and she ended up pleasing no-one, least of all herself. Another part of the problem was her half-sister Elizabeth, whom Mary detested as the daughter of "that protestant whore", Ann Boleyn, whose attraction for Henry resulted in Mary and her mother, Catherine of Aragon, being set aside. Elizabeth for her part disliked her older sister for the same reasons, leaving Mary looking for some way to put her aside and find a more 'suitable' heir.

Mary died at age forty-three, alone and unhappy. Her council had finally convinced her to accept Elizabeth as the only possible choice to succeed her, so Mary had pretty much nothing at all to bring her joy at the end of her short life.

While it's true that there were some three hundred protestant dissenters executed during her reign, her bad reputation seems to come from things written during Elizabeth's reign, when Mary came to be truly hated.

On the whole, Mary Tudor is well worth reading, if you like biographies that get to the root of the real person, and not just the accepted story.

[RealJambo]

'Apache' by Ed Macy.

An astonishing first book, Apache is a story of courage, comradeship, technology and tragedy, during the ongoing war in Afghanistan. 'Apache' is the first book to come from the cockpit of the most sophisticated fighting helicopter the world has ever known. Designed in the mid 1980s to take on the Soviets, these machines have proven themselves as the perfect tool for combat in Afghanistan.

Ed Macy's account of the incredibly hard Apache selection process, tougher than that of the SAS, combined with his description of the sheer difficulty of flying one of these helicopters provides a fascinating insight into the relationship between man and machine fighting in the toughest conditions imaginable.

The climactic build-up to the rescue mission at Jugroom Fort is both dramatic and deeply moving. The rescue of Lance Corporal Mathew Ford has been hailed as one of the most remarkable and daring rescues of modern wartime and Ed's bravery on the ground at Jugroom Fort led to him being awarded the Military Cross - one of the first in the Army Air Corps' history.

So far, I'm inclined to agree!

The Jugroom Fort mission was the one where colleagues flew outside of the aircraft!