Many pilots, including Douglas Bader, thought it was superior to the Spit--but together they saved Britain from Nazi invasion and possible defeat.Adrian Stewart has produced a gloriously atmospheric and nostalgic book capturing the spirit of these great aircraft and the pilots who flew them. It tracks the aircraft as it was developed and improved, and follows it to the many theaters of the war where it saw service. Among the lesser-known are Burma and hazardous convoy protection in the Arctic and Mediterranean, flying from makeshift carriers. This book will fascinate specialist aviation historians and those who enjoy a rattling good war story, and includes a superb selection of rare photographs.

     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.

    CRACK! AND THUMP is Scheffel's chilling account of ground combat of a young company-grade officer who fought with the 9th Infantry Division in North Africa, Sicily, France, Belgium, and Germany. Scheffel vividly recalls the terror, mind-numbing fatigue, raw emotions, and horrific conditions fighting men endured to achieve victory in World War II.

    In this fascinating coming-of-age memoir of the years 1942-1946, the sole surviving descendant of a prominent European dynasty of Hasidic rabbis describes her miraculous survival as a teenager wandering through the Holocaust.

    

    Following an emotional and traumatic escape from the advancing German forces they arrive in England. As a result of their experiences, and the manner that they combated the Nazi regime, the three sisters, all civilians, are seconded, along with the survivors of their group, into the intelligence section of General De Gaulle’s newly formed Free French Force. After extensive training in England they return to occupied France living in fear of betrayal and capture.

    Just six years old when a band of Nazi soldiers arrived in her tiny shtetl in Myadel, Poland, Linda observed atrocities no child ever needs to witness. With her parents and two brothers, during the summer of 1942, Linda was forcibly relocated into a ghetto where most of the Jewish men were led to the nearby forest and killed in a pogrom. After the massacre, Linda escaped with her family into the Ponar Forest, but only after evading Polish nationals and Nazis that patrolled Poland's countryside. Deep in the woods, Linda's family lived in a cave. They survived brutal winters, eluded partisan fighters that might force Linda's father to leave the family, and remained out of sight from Nazis and Polish police, who at one point, came only feet from their dugout.Written with historian Todd M. Mealy during a time when Holocaust deniers aim to rehabilitate the Nazi ideology and as roughly 400,000 survivors remain with us, Displaced presents Schwab's singular voice. Her narrative will help maintain-if not bolster-Holocaust knowledge, as her story of surviving the Polish wilderness during WWII and in a Displaced Persons Camp after the war is unique from most accounts. Displaced will inspire the rest of us to confront hatred in its many forms.

    . . The turret was rolling away when the Sherman ignited . . . a bright orange flame shot up, followed by a mushroom cloud explosion. . . flashes of tracer exploded across the battlefield . . . I must pay tribute to the crew of the second Sherman, who seemed undaunted . . ." Recorded by researchers in 1962, these three eyewitness statements by former Waffen SS panzer crewmen relate the sheer violence and aggression of tank combat between the late-war panzers and the Allied Sherman variants. Italy 1944: An SS Panther stands guard over a stricken Elefant tank destroyer, as US Army Shermans move in for the kill. Includes a rare account of the Sherman calliope in action. Normandy 1944: Two Panthers and supporting infantry cause havoc in a British supply line, including combat against the Sherman Firefly and Churchill Crocodile. The Ardennes 1945: A Jagdtiger takes on a series of Shermans in the final stages of the Ardennes campaign, told in ruthless clarity by the Jagdtiger's 128mm gun crew. With ice-cold detail, phenomenal drama and sense of crisis, these first-hand accounts stand out today as one of the most remarkable testimonies to the experience of tank warfare in WW2. They will fascinate anyone interested in tank combat, the Waffen SS, the Sherman variants in action and the use of armor from 1941 to 1945. The complete collection of these unique interviews, covering panzer battles from Barbarossa to Berlin, is available in the Sprech Media book 'SS Panzer SS Voices.'

     When the German war machine rolled over the Netherlands in May 1940, Titia Wetselaar Bozuwa was an eight-year-old girl living in the southern city of Breda. She wrote about her family’s endurance of that five-year Occupation in her memoir, In the Shadow of the Cathedral. In Defiance, her first work of fiction, she pays tribute to the many who defied the German Occupation. Challenging the expectations of Dutch society, Anna Smits enrolls as a medical student at Utrecht University. But in a country occupied by Nazi Germany, student life is not what Anna expected. Social clubs are closed; Jews are forbidden from attending schools; and in 1943, students are ordered to sign a declaration of loyalty to the occupying German government. Anna and her seven closest friends—the Group of Eight—refuse to sign. Inspired by a sermon about the Good Samaritan—a sermon that got the minister thrown into prison—the Group of Eight vows to help the victims of Hitler’s brutal regime. They hide Jews and provide them with fake IDs; they keep desperately needed medicines out of the hands of the Nazis; they raise funds for orphaned Jewish children. But as the war drags on and the Nazis’ hold tightens, the Group of Eight shrinks. The few that remain defiantly resist the ever-onerous Occupying force. But how can they fight the lawlessness with which the Germans shoot first and don’t bother with questions? How can they fight the devastating Hunger Winter of 1945? Anna clings to her beliefs and mission, aided by her remarkable grandmother, Baroness van Haersolte, as the country waits for liberation. But will they all survive that long?

    The name Peiper will always be linked to the Malmédy Massacre, the death of Belgian civilians and more than seventy American soldiers, but there is still a myth around Peiper. Why was a twenty-nine year old Waffen-SS officer chosen to lead the German spearhead unit during the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944? Peiper was a special leader within the one of the most elite Waffen-SS divisions, the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler. Peiper was charismatic and extreme loyal to his unit. His men trusted him as a leader, even under the most extreme conditions. In Germany he was a well-known war hero. It was a logical decision that Peiper became the commander of the spearhead unit, but there were other factors leading to this decision: tactical considerations, a we-know-what-to-expect-principle, and Peiper was lucky that he was still alive and serving in the Waffen-SS.

    This fast moving novel shows the battles, the raids and the strategy which led to the capture of this vital port.

    She soon discovered her mama had been hiding secrets from her since she was a small child. These secrets start to unfold when she opens a box hidden in the back of a closet. Opening this box will create an entirely different world that Karlee never dreamed was waiting for her. Will Karlee have the strength and courage to face the secrets, or will she close the box keeping everyone from knowing the truth? If you like funny, heartwarming Southern stories with a touch of mystery, you will fall in love with the characters in The Problem with Pearls.

    As a dogface soldier, he fought in some of the most bitter battles of the war, liberated two concentration camps, and captured Hitler's private mountain retreat in Berchtesgaden (Band of Brothers had the facts wrong here). His memoir is testimony to the bravery of American servicemen in the face of evil.

    And with G-d's help, he saved not only himself but also his parents and a host of friends, relatives, and strangers from almost certain death. If Ludvik Wieder's adventures were fiction, they would seem too contrived. But everything told is the unembellished truth. At the age of 26, Ludvik had it all—health, wealth, good looks, popularity, and a growing business in one of Europe's brightest capitals. Then, one dreadful Sunday in the spring of 1943, the Nazis marched into Budapest and imposed a series of repressive measures that threatened the life of every Jew in Hungary. From that day on, all that mattered was survival. Suddenly, life hung by a shred of paper— the proper “Aryan” identification. Determined to survive, Ludvik boldly entered the black market to buy those precious scraps of false identity that might save him and his loved ones from disaster. Soon he was living a double life, outwardly forsaking his Orthodox Jewish upbringing to pose as a gentile, at the same time clinging steadfastly to his beliefs, never for a moment forgetting who he was and where he came from. Soon he became a master of deception— whether it was posing as a trusted “gentile” factory employee, disguising himself as a drunken peasant, or assuming the dress and manner of a member of the Hungarian S.S. Somehow, he had the capacity to enlist the aid of an unlikely assortment of non-Jews, who helped him at the peril of their lives—among them, a peasant woman who befriended him in prison and offered her home as his haven for the duration of the war… a Hungarian Air Force officer, who “adopted” Ludvik's niece as his own illegitimate child, lent him his apartment as a hiding place and smuggled a series of vital ID papers to him… the Skid Row derelict who saved the life of Ludvik's nephew by pretending to be the boy's uncle. The book traces Ludvik's life, beginning with his placid, essentially easygoing boyhood in Czechoslovakia. Then, in 1940, after the Hungarian takeover, he was inducted into forced labor. It describes the cruelty and black humor of the labor camp, which helped him to develop the cunning and ingenuity that enabled him to sharpen his survival skills and avoid being sent to fatal service on the Russian front. The story then focuses on the Nazi occupation, culminating in Ludvik's near-execution at the hands of his Russian liberators. Armed with optimism, unswerving faith in the Almighty, and his own resourcefulness, Ludvik never let fear keep him from doing whatever was necessary to save himself and his fellow Jews. Throughout his heart-stopping adventures —and even in the darkest moments of despair, when events propelled him to the brink of suicide—Ludvik was motivated to go on by consummate devotion to his beloved mother. He knew he had to survive, for he had promised her he would.