What are you reading at the moment?

Discussion in 'Books, Films, TV, Radio' started by Gage, Mar 12, 2006.

  1. bamboo43

    bamboo43 Very Senior Member

    Please to have given some small assistance towards the content of this family memoir:

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  2. kopite

    kopite Member

    Well done Steve!

    I just read the preview on Amazon and saw your name and website cited in the Acknowledgements. It also mentions some places in the Liverpool area I’m very familiar with. It looks a very interesting book and I’ll most likely order a copy to read.
     
  3. bamboo43

    bamboo43 Very Senior Member

    Thanks Steve. The book is a nice family memoir, put together by Tommy Roberts' daughter, it has opened up some more avenues for me and my research. :)
     
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  4. Drew5233

    Drew5233 #FuturePilot 1940 Obsessive

    Currently reading The Royal Navy at Dunkirk by Martin Mace. First WW2 book I've picked up properly in close to 12 months and enjoying it.
     
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  5. Chris C

    Chris C Canadian

    Just finished Flying to Victory and I think it is excellent. I knew nothing about the chiefly bad relations between British army and air force in the early part of the war. They were lucky to have O'Connor and Collishaw working harmoniously together to conduct operations against the Italians. (And Tedder does not come out smelling like roses in all of this.)
     
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  6. Orwell1984

    Orwell1984 Senior Member

    [​IMG]

    Interesting study of an airfield used by both sides in the SCW. Lots of great images.
     
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  7. Chris C

    Chris C Canadian

    Currently reading this. After reading the book about Collishaw which focuses really on the high level - this book is the opposite and in fact I feel it is even a little constrictive - I don't think it talks enough about the big picture. But there's a great wealth of detail here.

    Also, it's touted as a "reference" and I think it could do with an index.

    [​IMG]
     
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  8. Orwell1984

    Orwell1984 Senior Member

    [​IMG]

    The End of the Beginning: Symposium on the Land/Air Co-operation in the Mediterranean War, 1940-43

    picked this up because it was referenced in another book I was reading some interesting articles in here:
    . It's the collection from a 1992 symposium at Bracknell held the RAF Historical society and RAF Staff College. A number of war time air men attended and contributed.in the smaller discussion groups and their comments are worth the price of the book alone.

    Can be downloaded here for free:
    RAF Historical Society Journals | Collections | Research | RAF Museum
     
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  9. A-58

    A-58 Not so senior Member

    I love anything with P-40s!
     
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  10. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    Collishaw should be a Canadian household name but always seemed to be under appreciated. Billy Bishop got all the glory but Raymond ended WW1 with 60 victories, as an RNAS pilot, third highest kills of the British Empire. Some historians credit him with 81 (unofficial) kills. He was much decorated with the CB, DSO & Bar, OBE, DSC and DFC. By all accounts, he performed admirably in Egypt with limited and antiquated resources.

    https://www.theepochtimes.com/a-forgotten-hero-canadas-greatest-airman-raymond-collishaw_345975.html
     
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  11. Chris C

    Chris C Canadian

    Tedder seems to get most of the glory for organizing things in the Desert Air Force but fundamentally (according to the book) Collishaw was basically responsible for keeping his HQ with the army's and for determining the air force's priorities: obtain air superiority, keep the enemy on his back foot so that (hopefully) they waste planes on constant defensive patrols, pick ground targets to disrupt supplies, avoid ground targets with heavy AA defense to prevent high casualties, resist army demands for CONSTANT defensive patrols of your own.
     
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  12. Markyboy

    Markyboy Member

    [​IMG] I've just finished this one, and I can't recommend it highly enough. There's even a whole chapter on Collishaw, so it links in with some of the titles mentioned above. The author was a pre war armourer who volunteered to be an air gunner, initially in Audax aircraft and then Lysanders in Egypt. Accepted for pilot training he went to Rhodesia and was posted to England flying Hurricane IIB fighter bombers. He then converted to Typhoons, flying many operations in the lead up to D-Day. Finally, he attended an advanced Armourers course, which resulted in him becoming a booby trap expert, running training courses to a variety of personnel. Altogether a very varied pre and wartime career.
     
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  13. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

    Dipping into varied sections of this: the parts on Malaya, Suez and China/Hong Kong.

    To be honest, I forgot I'd ever bought it, and pleasant though wide surveys can be they often lack specificity, which is why it lingered on the shelf, but so far I'm impressed--the author keeps one eye on the horizon and one on military implications from the political realm.

    William Jackson (British Army officer) - Wikipedia

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    Last edited: Mar 20, 2018
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  14. bamboo43

    bamboo43 Very Senior Member

    I'm reading: Wavell. Portrait of a Soldier, by Bernard Fergusson.

    Interesting little book recording Fergusson's time as Wavell's ADC.
     
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  15. Warlord

    Warlord Veteran wannabe

    Very interesting stuff, mate, as usual ;)
     
  16. The Cooler King

    The Cooler King Elite Member

    Popped into WHS Today..... there are some great offers on books at the moment, picked up these two hardbacks. £30 RRP!!! Books.jpg
     
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  17. bamboo43

    bamboo43 Very Senior Member

    A couple of bargains there CK. :salut:
     
  18. Orwell1984

    Orwell1984 Senior Member

    [​IMG]
    South Pacific Air War - Volume 1, The Fall of Rabaul, December 1941-March 1942

    Great use of sources from both sides, just a very well produced and excellent publication. Great read too!.
    You can order through bookdepository.com and get free shipping so save some dosh!
     
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  19. Warlord

    Warlord Veteran wannabe

    Plan to get yer hands on volume 2?

    Stone & Stone: Book Information

    Sounds even better than this one!

    BTW, hope they plan to include the Timor Sea Handicap (Benghazi style :D), even though a little to the west of their actual line of development. If not, coverage of NEI squadrons operations would do the trick ;)
     
  20. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    I must have first read this classic some 40 years ago and decided it was worth a second reading.
    The Regiment, by Farley Mowat, was written in 1955, as a unit history of the Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment. Mowat served with the unit in combat as a junior officer until becoming a battle exhaustion casualty during the hard winter of 1943–44 near Ortona. He spent the remainder of the war as a staff officer.

    And No Birds Sang along with My Father's Son are also both excellent WW2 books by Mowat that I may also pick up again.

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