The Shield: a novel


Nachman Kataczinsky - 2014
    M. Stirlings’s Island in the Sea of Time. Twenty-first century Israel finds itself transferred to 1941 days before Nazi Germany plans to attack the Soviet Union. Opportunities abound for changing history and the population – including terrorists, tourists, diplomats, and pacifists – has divergent goals. Everything is debated and every action has unpredictable consequences. The Shield follows an extended family as they adapt to their changed world. The businessman sees opportunities, his son in the army faces new enemies, and the cousin visiting from America is confused and angry. The Israeli government, a fractious coalition with diverse goals, struggles to protection the population in a world they only think they understand. Fun reading for fans of alternate history and time-travel fiction – highly recommended!

Empire of the Clouds: When Britain's Aircraft Ruled the World


James Hamilton-Paterson - 2010
    And what aircraft they were. The sleek Comet, the first jet airliner. The awesome delta-winged Vulcan, an intercontinental bomber that could be thrown about the sky like a fighter. The Hawker Hunter, the most beautiful fighter-jet ever built and the Lightning, which could zoom ten miles above the clouds in a couple of minutes and whose pilots rated flying it as better than sex.How did Britain so lose the plot that today there is not a single aircraft manufacturer of any significance in the country? What became of the great industry of de Havilland or Handley Page? And what was it like to be alive in that marvellous post-war moment when innovative new British aircraft made their debut, and pilots were the rock stars of the age?James Hamilton-Paterson captures that season of glory in a compelling book that fuses his own memories of being a schoolboy plane spotter with a ruefully realistic history of British decline - its loss of self confidence and power. It is the story of great and charismatic machines and the men who flew them: heroes such as Bill Waterton, Neville Duke, John Derry and Bill Beaumont who took inconceivable risks, so that we could fly without a second thought.

Killing the Hangman


Ellie Midwood - 2019
     Two Czechoslovakian patriots who are ready to risk their own lives to stop him. The most daring assassination of WW2. “You are tasked with a mission of the utmost importance. As you know, Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich is one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany as of now. He’s efficient in his methods, ruthless, extremely intelligent, and can’t be underestimated. A man like him will give you only one chance to kill him; if you don’t use it, he’ll kill you and it won’t be a fast and merciful death.” The Gestapo chief and the man, whom Hitler himself calls The Man with the Iron Heart, arrives in Prague and soon earns himself the name of The Hangman among its population. When the order comes from London calling the Czech resistance to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich, they have to decide fast, what is stronger - self-preservation or heroic death in the name of freedom. “We can’t die tonight. Fate wouldn’t allow us to die before we complete our mission. Heydrich’s appointment as the Protector has perverted the very sense of the word. He’s not the Protector; we are. We are coming to restore the correct order of things, how they should be. When the strong protect the weak, not when the strong bully everyone who goes against them into blind submission, or hangs them regardless of age, sex, class or origin. No, we can’t die. Otherwise, this whole world won’t make sense to me anymore.” Based on true events, “Killing the Hangman” follows Josef Gabčík’s and Jan Kubiš’s training in Britain, their parachute drop into Czechoslovakia, and the eventual planning and carrying out of the assassination itself. It also provides an intimate glimpse into the life of Heydrich himself, his recent appointment, the infamous Wannsee Conference, and his eventual death. (Formerly a part of a USA-Today bestselling anthology “The Darkest Hour”)

Blackpool Evacuee


Maggie Mason - 2018
    Clara is worked like a dog, but the warmth of her Blackpool friendships will go far to save her. Julia just wants to find her beloved daughter - but the trials of war will keep them far apart. They will meet again - but the war will change everything for mother and daughter...

Island Victory: The Battle of Kwajalein Atoll


S.L.A. Marshall - 1982
     This was the first time the Americans had penetrated the “outer ring” of the Japanese Pacific sphere. From now until the end of the war the combined forces of the Navy, Marine Corps and Army would island hop their way to the Japanese mainland. Yet, the Battle of Kwajalein Atoll, particularly on the island of Roi-Namur where there were only 51 survivors of the original 3,500 garrison left, gave the Americans an insight into the fierce resistance that the Japanese would put up over the remaining months of the war. Drawn directly from the testimonies of several hundred infantrymen, Island Victory provides insight into what it was like to feel the heat of battle on the beaches of those Pacific islands. "Written accounts of war simply do not get any closer to the actions and feelings of those [who] were there. Island Victory is a highly recommended, 'must read' book." — The Midwest Book Review "The real value of Island Victory lies in the unadorned words of these soldiers, recorded so openly and methodically by Marshall after the battle. . . . The Kwajalein victors interviewed so painstakingly by Sam Marshall provide a priceless candor and authenticity, the emotional testimonies of young men still flushed with adrenalin, guilt, and relief." — Joseph H. Alexander, Journal of Military History S. L. A. Marshall was a chief U.S. Army combat historian during World War II and the Korean War. He had served on the border with Mexico during the Pancho Villa Expedition before serving in France during World War I. He wrote over thirty books about warfare. Island Victory was first published in 1944. Marshall passed away in 1977.

Hey Doc!: The Battle of Okinawa As Remembered by a Marine Corpsman


Ed Wells - 2017
    This is the wartime memories of a Marine Corpsman who served in Company B, of the 6th Battalion of the 4th Regiment. He saw 100 days of continuous combat during the Battle of Okinawa, including the Battle for Sugar Loaf, and was part of the landing force that was headed to Japan when the atomic bomb dropped. These were recorded after 60 years of reflection, and are presented to honor all veterans.

The Angel of Auschwitz: [Extended Version]


S.A. Falconi - 2014
    I vow to you and to the leaders that you set for me, absolute allegiance until death. So help me God!”The SS Oath of Loyalty – words that became the very death sentence for millions of Jews and Germans alike. Six decades later, we still ask ourselves why and how did it happen? "The Angel of Auschwitz", a tragic epic of historical fiction, explores these inquiries through the eyes of an unlikely antagonist-turned-protagonist – the Nazi soldier."The Angel of Auschwitz" chronicles the life of Wolfgang Bremmer, an adolescent boy from the hills of Hamburg during the Nazi occupation of Germany. As a Hitler Youth, Wolfgang is captivated by the prowess of the Nazis and thrust into the ideologies of Adolf Hitler. With an adoration for the new Fűhrer and the Third Reich, Wolfgang enlists as a young man in the SS-Death’s Head Division, the gatekeepers of the regime’s most lethal concentration camp, Dachau. It is here he is introduced to Theodor Eicke’s “School of Violence” and becomes one of the most ruthless guards the SS has ever seen. After joining Hitler’s Mobile Killing Units, he participates in the invasion of Poland and the evacuation and extermination of its Jewish inhabitants. Wolfgang is the ideal Nazi warrior: vicious, ruthless, and entirely intolerant.But evil erodes even the hardest of hearts and Wolfgang grows weary in the midst of all the death and destruction. His conscience begins to return and with that a gnawing guilt for what he and his fellow Germans have done and are about to do. But with the fear of punishment for treason, Wolfgang is trapped in the cyclone of violence. That is, until he is promoted as a guard at the Reich’s most sophisticated concentration camp, Auschwitz. In the belly of such a beast as Auschwitz, Wolfgang discovers a secret that will not only save his own life and salvation, but the lives of so many prisoners as well.

BUNKER 1945 - The Last Ten Days of ADOLF HITLER


Christian Shakespeare - 2019
    Twenty-two years later, he did. April 1945 – Berlin. The world had been at war for more than five-and-a-half years – approximately seventy million people were dead across the globe. The epicentre of the twelve-year-old Third Reich was now surrounded, enveloped by bitter Soviet forces hardened by Nazi barbarity in the east over the last four years. As the buildings were blasted into rubble, pounded by Russian guns and bombs, before their troops and tanks, Hitler was hunkered down in his last headquarters – the dark and damp bunker under the Reich Chancellery. As the Third Reich began to crumble as fast as the city’s buildings, what was the state of mind of the tyrant? Only his closest and fanatical allies saw the collapse, none more so than Hitler’s servants, Otto Gunsche and Heinz Linge – two individuals which witnessed the final act of their regime. An act tinged over the last ten days in late April with selfish betrayal, increasingly forlorn hope, pleas, desperation and eventually suicide. As the Soviets closed in with impending vigour, in the concrete tomb below ground and under the thunderous booms of the petrifying battle for Berlin, the mind of the dictator disintegrated into drugs, delusion and a determination to die. Not by the enemy bullet but one of his own. This is the story of the people who held a unique place in world history – the ones who were there when the nightmare of Nazism and the horrors which accompanied it was finally banished as a dark chapter in the story of the human race.

World War 2: Stories Of The Schutzstaffel: True Accounts Of Hitler’s Personal Bodyguards (World War 2, German War, World War 2 History, Irma Grese, Auschwitz, Waffen SS Book 1)


Cyrus J. Zachary - 2016
    Not only was he hated by the whole world, even some of his own military commanders didn’t like him. Most leaders around the world rely on one, maybe two bodyguards to keep them safe. Even the President of the United States today has only one or two teams of security personnel; while there may be many men and women who take turns to protect their leader, the numbers are not as big as you would expect it to be. We will look at the origins of a number of bodies, such as the ‘Sturmabteilung’ or the SA, the Schutzstaffel (the SS) and the many other sub-sections of the SS such as the FBK, the LSSAH, etc., all of which were tasked with protecting Hitler. From the background, we will move on to individual accounts of men who served on these teams – they were Hitler’s personal bodyguards and some stayed with him until the very end. Humanity’s depraved nature came to fore with these men; despite having a master who was truly mad and ravenous for blood, they served him loyally. Was it because they were also as depraved as he was? Or were they afraid for their lives and did what they had to, to survive? We can only wonder... ===>>> Download this book today! <<<===

The Smallest Crack (A Holocaust Story, #1)


Roberta Kagan - 2019
    Eli knows that their only chance for survival may lie in the hands of Gretchen, a spirited Aryan girl. However, the forbidden and dangerous friendship between Eli and Gretchen has been a secret until now. Because, for Eli, if it is discovered that he has been keeping company with a woman other than his wife it will bring shame to him and his family. For Gretchen her friendship with a Jew is forbidden by law and could cost her, her life.

Hitler's British Isles


Duncan Barrett - 2018
    'An absolutely fascinating account of life under German rule in the Channel Islands during the war. As a Guernsey girl I grew up with these stories and recognise family and friends in these pages. Duncan Barrett has done a brilliant job of reflecting the peculiar challenges that existed for those living under occupation. It is an under-told story of an extraordinary time in recent British history.'  - Sarah Montague, The Today Programme presenter.**The new book from the Sunday Times bestselling author of Sugar Girls** In the summer of 1940, Britain stood perilously close to invasion. One by one, the nations of Europe had fallen to the unstoppable German Blitzkrieg, and Hitler’s sights were set on the English coast. And yet, following the success of the Battle of Britain, the promised invasion never came. The prospect of German jackboots landing on British soil retreated into the realm of collective nightmares.  But the spectre of what might have been is one that has haunted us down the decades, finding expression in counterfactual history and outlandish fictions. What would a British occupation have looked like?  The answer lies closer to home than we think, in the experiences of the Channel Islanders – the only British people to bear the full brunt of German Occupation.  For five years, our nightmares became their everyday reality. The people of Guernsey, Jersey and Sark got to know the enemy as those on the mainland never could, watching in horror as their towns and villages were suddenly draped in Swastika flags, their cinemas began showing Nazi propaganda films, and Wehrmacht soldiers goose-stepped down their highstreets. Those who resisted the regime, such as the brave men and women who set up underground newspapers or sheltered slave labourers, encountered the full force of Nazi brutality. But in the main, the Channel Islands occupation was a ‘model’ one, a prototype for how the Fuhrer planned to run mainland Britain. As a result, the stories of the islanders are not all misery and terror. Many, in fact are rather funny – tales of plucky individuals trying to get by in almost impossible circumstances, and keeping their spirits up however they could. Unlike their compatriots on the mainland, the islanders had no Blitz to contend with, but they met the thousand other challenges the war brought with a similar indomitable spirit. The story of the Channel Islands during the war is the history that could so nearly have come to pass for the rest of us.  Based on interviews with over a hundred islanders who lived through it, this book tells that story from beginning to end, opening the lid on life in Hitler’s British Isles.

The Fighting Captain


Alan Burn - 1993
    Without the convoys no supplies; without supplies certainly no Second Front. Captain Frederic Walker RN devised and employed tactics which were the only sure means of combating and ultimately defeating the U-boat Wolf packs, but it was only when the Lords of the Admiralty came to employ these tactics that the U-boats were finally defeated.No one did more to regain control of the North Atlantic than Captain Walker. His relentless battle with the U-boat Wolf packs, amounting almost to a personal duel with Admiral Donitz, is an epic saga which has long deserved a larger page in the story of our nation's history, though he did achieve the rare distinction of winning the DSO and three bars. Alan Burn, who served under Walker, brilliantly recaptures the feeling of those dramatic days - the sheer bloody hell of the Atlantic weather, the ever-present menace of the lurking U-boats, but above all the quite remarkable and indomitable spirit which Walker managed to inspire in all who served in the ships under his command. Not only the citizens of Liverpool, where Walker is still revered as a local hero, but all who hold freedom dear will appreciate this well-merited tribute to a largely unsung hero who did as much as any man to preserve that freedom.

In the Shadow of Majdanek. Hiding in Full Sight . : A Holocaust Survival Story


Irene R. Skolnick - 2017
    This is what mother decided would be our best chance at survival. This was not an easy undertaking. To blend into the Polish community it was essential not to look Jewish; not to sound Jewish; to know a fair amount about Catholicism; and be able to think on your feet when unexpected events occurred. Above all one needed to be lucky. With counterfeit documents we changed our name and moved to Lublin, the site of Majdanek, the second largest concentration camp in Poland. At that time I was five years old and my brother was seven. We had to learn new names and to never reveal our past. No sooner we got settled that members of my father’s family descended on us seeking shelter. In a small, primitive house we hid up to eight members of my father’s family.

Behind the Darkened Glass


Rachel R. Heil - 2019
    As Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party take control of the country, a young German woman returns to the country of her birth. Fleeing into the arms of her aunt, Charlotte Brookfield pays no attention to the events surrounding her as she tries to recover from a devastating discovery. Hans von Peterson is an officer in the country’s brutal SS. While courting the admiration of his superior and fighting off rivalries, Hans is sent to Berlin to accomplish a seemingly impossible task. That task has Hans crossing paths with Charlotte. Despite the odds, the two begin a love affair just as the Nazis begin to tighten their grip on the country leading to a bloody climax that will change everything.

Secret Weapons of World War II


Gerald Pawle - 1957
     For the next four years they would become instrumental in the secret war against Germany, developing a wide array of armaments to give Britain the upper hand against the might of the Axis forces. Under the guidance of Charles Goodeve, a remarkable Canadian with a flair for picking out which invention could tip the war in the Allies’ favor, these scientists and inventors worked tirelessly, and even put their lives on the line, in the quest to give Churchill’s military the knockout weapon. As Nevil Shute, who was an engineer with the Wheezers and Dodgers stated, “If any one quality was a common requirement for the officers in this unusual department I would say it was imagination — the imagination to look forward and to visualize what might happen.” Not all of their inventions were successful, indeed Sir Charles Madden, who served as staff officer to the Director of the Department stated that during his time there he dealt with “a medley of suggestions ranging from the impractical to the lunatic.” Yet, despite some mishaps, the Wheezers and Dodgers were instrumental in aiding the Allies to victory, with their degaussing method of protecting ships from mines to their Hedgehog weapon that destroyed over forty-five enemy submarines. Secret Weapons of World War II records all of the Department’s developments through the course of the conflict, both successful and not, and is written with humor and insight. “Their story has the fascination of the unexpected, in a British well-played spirit.” Kirkus Reviews Gerald Pawle worked with the Wheezers and Dodgers through the course of World War Two. This work was first published under the title The Secret War: 1939-1945 in 1957. Pawle passed away in 1991.