Sure to be among the year’s best histories of World War II.
A veteran historian and journalist pulls together many historical threads in this portrait of the “battle for the Middle East…one of the critical fronts of World War II.”
Gorenberg, a winner of the National Jewish Book Award who has been covering Middle Eastern affairs for more than 35 years, begins with a vivid portrait of Cairo in July 1942, its air dense with smoke from burning diplomatic documents, the streets packed with fleeing vehicles. Axis forces under Gen. Erwin Rommel had crossed the border and seemed unstoppable. Maj. Bonner Frank Fellers, America’s military attaché in Cairo, reported the news to Washington along with a description of British forces and his opinion that they were on the verge of collapse. Rommel also read Fellers’ report; he had been reading them since America entered the war. The author then rewinds the clock to the British countryside in 1939. Unlike the film The Imitation Game, Gorenberg delivers historically accurate and fascinating descriptions of Bletchley Park as a collection of smart, workaholic men and women that included a sprinkling of geniuses. They produced not one but many breakthroughs regarding the constantly changing Axis codes. Assigned to read decrypts to discover spies, one expert noticed that Rommel was receiving useful information from a source in Cairo. More digging pointed to the American military attaché. It turned out that the efficient Italian intelligence service routinely rifled the unguarded embassy safes in Rome, so American codes were no secret. Once they were changed, Rommel began complaining of the quality of his intelligence, and the British continued to eavesdrop. Gorenberg’s gimlet eye reveals a remarkably unheroic Rommel, unimaginative British generalship, know-it-all American leadership, and a delightful cast of colonial officials, family, unhappy Egyptian royalty, Arab nationalists, adventurers, and even two bumbling Nazi spies out of central casting. The author also includes a helpful cast of characters, divided by country, and a list of relevant intelligence and security agencies.
Sure to be among the year’s best histories of World War II.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-61039-627-1
Page Count: 480
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2020
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Gibbins combines historical knowledge with a sense of adventure, making this book a highly enjoyable package.
A popular novelist turns his hand to historical writing, focusing on what shipwrecks can tell us.
There’s something inherently romantic about shipwrecks: the mystery, the drama of disaster, the prospect of lost treasure. Gibbins, who’s found acclaim as an author of historical fiction, has long been fascinated with them, and his expertise in both archaeology and diving provides a tone of solid authority to his latest book. The author has personally dived on more than half the wrecks discussed in the book; for the other cases, he draws on historical records and accounts. “Wrecks offer special access to history at all…levels,” he writes. “Unlike many archaeological sites, a wreck represents a single event in which most of the objects were in use at that time and can often be closely dated. What might seem hazy in other evidence can be sharply defined, pointing the way to fresh insights.” Gibbins covers a wide variety of cases, including wrecks dating from classical times; a ship torpedoed during World War II; a Viking longship; a ship of Arab origin that foundered in Indonesian waters in the ninth century; the Mary Rose, the flagship of the navy of Henry VIII; and an Arctic exploring vessel, the Terror (for more on that ship, read Paul Watson’s Ice Ghost). Underwater excavation often produces valuable artifacts, but Gibbins is equally interested in the material that reveals the society of the time. He does an excellent job of placing each wreck within a broader context, as well as examining the human elements of the story. The result is a book that will appeal to readers with an interest in maritime history and who would enjoy a different, and enlightening, perspective.
Gibbins combines historical knowledge with a sense of adventure, making this book a highly enjoyable package.Pub Date: April 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781250325372
Page Count: 304
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 28, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
