My take on Band of Brothers books

[newredshoes]

I feel like I keep seeing people talk about reading BoB books! I have thoughts on this, having read many of them. I'm... supposed to be eating breakfast now, so this is just a quick c+p from a message I sent someone earlier, but I hope it's helpful/interesting/all that!

Comments

[swankyfunk]

Brilliant. Thank you. I know I'll never have enough time to read everything but at least I know where my interests lie most and where to start. The Studs Terkel book really does sound amazing.

[newredshoes]

Hooray! That's what this is for, really -- glad it helped!

I seriously want to be Studs Terkel when I grow up. I need to get my hands on his other books too.

[brewsternorth]

Thankyou thankyou thankyou. I think between you and a couple of other BoB-fan journals I've been lurking on, I'd gathered that these were the ones to look out for, but it's nice to have the list in the one post.

[newredshoes]

You're more than welcome! This makes me think I should post this to aldbournewhores or something. Glad you find it useful!

[skew_whiff]

Great set of quick reviews, this. For the most part, I think we're in agreement here

[newredshoes]

I definitely agree with you on the range and access of the Ambrose book! Obviously I'm thrilled that there's so much Smokey and Harry. I think I want to give it a reread -- like the Malarkey book, I'm going off old memories, and my reread of Easy Company Soldier has proved surprising and enlightening.

Webster's letters are pretty great too: there's an appendix with about ten of them. He's also the only one I see talking about actually leaving the company, after Austria, so that's interesting too.

[skew_whiff]

What do you mean by 'leaving the company'? As in, he was considering transferring somewhere else, or just about what happened after the war ended? Because as I recall, there's some stuff about that in Biggest Brother, too, like about how frustrated Winters got waiting for the army to let him go home, and how he had to spend ages stuck in some crappy camp in France.

[newredshoes]

I think it was both? There's a scene where Webster is walking past Easy guys... possibly in Austria, and he's waving to them and talking about heading back to France, and then yeah, he's stuck in France for a little while with an artillery unit or something.

[jonesandashes]

Here from aldbournewhores - Oooh, excellent. Eventually I'll find time to read some of these, and I'm glad to have go-to list. I'd never even heard of The Good War, but it sounds super interesting.

[newredshoes]

First, gorgeous icon! Oh Grant.

And I'm glad this was helpful! Studs Terkel is an illustrious alum of my school, so they would talk about him all the time. I'm sad I only actually read his work after he passed away -- he's really excellent stuff!

[jonesandashes]

Hee, thanks. Grant is love. :)

[foofighter0234]

Stunning.

I am personally chomping at the bit for A Company of Heroes to come out, mainly because my favorite guys are talked about (Skip, Penky, Gene &hearts)

[newredshoes]

I'm really looking forward to those too. I imagine we'll get some letters, which is exciting. The real triumph would be getting anything at all from Nixon, who as far as I can tell refused to participate in any way with anybody.

[foofighter0234]

The letters will be very interesting.