Bad Books

Discussion in 'Books, Films, TV, Radio' started by Kyt, Dec 2, 2006.

  1. Kyt

    Kyt Very Senior Member

    In line with the Bad Sex Prize that was awarded last week for the worst depiction of sex in fictional writing, I thought we could start a "Bad War Writing Prize".

    So nominate a book or article that you think was badly written, factually wrong, or just plain irritated you. Just two rules. Firstly, it has to be of a military theme, and secondly, any nomination has to contain a short statement about why you chose it.

    p.s. it doesn't have to be a recent publication, or in English.

    My nomination is :

    "The Darkest Hour: The Hidden History of the Home Front 1939-45" by Stuart Hylton.

    A great idea badly executed. The premise was to highlight some of the "myths" about the home front, but Hylton writes in such a sensationalist superficial style, that I found myself getting very annoyed - even though the actual issues discussed were interesting (unprepared government, affects of the blitz on morale etc).
     
  2. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    Generals Die in Bed Charles Yale Harrison
    Canadian WW1 book.
    Just hated everything about it.
    Read it here GENERALS DIE IN BED
    It really grated me as it portryed the CEF as a rabble of indisicplined young thugs.
     
  3. Chris C

    Chris C Canadian

    I'm partway through Rude Mechanicals which is about British WW2 tank development and I really don't like it. For a book about tank development, the author really isn't talking about what the specifications of the tanks were or what was tried to solve technical issues. For instance, I understand that the problems with the Crusader mostly got worked out in the end.

    But there's something about his tone which is just annoying and I just hate that he thinks the TOG was actually a wasted opportunity instead of a white elephant. you would have to try very hard to convince me that it's armour would really have stood up to anti tank fire when it was as slow as it was, and I think the Heavy Churchill was better armoured anyway.

    I think the author is an idiot and yet feel like I should in some way finish reading the book.
     
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  4. Orwell1984

    Orwell1984 Senior Member

  5. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    Funny you started this, Seroster, as a day or two ago I was wondering to some others here behind the scenes if we had a specific 'Shit Books' thread.
    We should have one too. Nice one.

    So.

    Where to start...
    Anthony Beevor: The Battle for Spain.

    images.jpg

    "I fancy knowing more about that civil war" I thought.
    "Hmmm, there's an apparently accessible well-known book for a few quid that ought to start me off."
    Strewth...
    Should have been more wary, having found his 'Stalingrad' so dull, but this book makes that dreary reduction of such a mighty clash of arms to a list of statistics look like great literature.
    I believe it was a revision and re-working of an earlier academic paper of his (?... or was that the Greece one?), well, I pity the poor tutor who had to wade through some sort of raw version, as the supposedly fully edited and sorted out book still ranks as one of the worst history titles I've read.
    Well, I say 'read', I abandoned at about 2/3rds, faintly annoyed with myself as I hammered my way through the Silmarillion & Mein Kampf by the power of sheer bloody-mindedness.


    Others for consideration:

    Manstein: Lost Victories. "What? Me? No... I was somewhere else entirely. What are these Nazis you speak of?"
    Anything by Franz Kurowski.- Steel steely steely.
    SS Steel Storm & SS Steel Rain by Tim Ripley (I really should avoid 'Steel' in titles.)
    And, of course, Cooper/Ambrose's 'Death Traps', which could have been so interesting as just a simple memoir, a passing point of view, but due to... well... things... has possibly done more harm to one of my favourite areas than any other popular book.

    More controversial choice:
    Guderian. "I moved some tanks from here to here, then I cunningly moved some more tanks from there to there, then I made another inspired move of some tanks, I am very good at moving tanks" &c. &c. ad nauseum...

    I bet loads more spring to mind.
    Some fine potential for disagreement too. I mean; I like Max Hastings books.
     
  6. canuck

    canuck Closed Account

    Not WW2 but Maj. Gen. Romeo Dallaire's book, Shake Hands with the Devil (regarding the genocide in Rwanda) was so badly written that I couldn't get through it. That despite being highly interested in the subject and making 3 separate attempts.

    It may be that I'm simply not that bright but I found Solzhenitsyn to be impenetrable as well.
     
  7. Chris C

    Chris C Canadian

    Eww, yeah, any fascist apologia deserves to get consigned to oblivion.

    Questionable to include in this list: I thought Bridge over Remagen spent a lot of words on what seemed like pretty peripheral stuff. I guess he was trying to build a sort of holistic picture but it was the first time I'd read something like that. I was expecting more about the actual action and what followed as opposed to stuff about, say, the townsfolk.

    The only Beevor I've read is his Ardennes 1944.
     
  8. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    Field Marshal Lord Carver's 'Britain's Army in the 20th Century'.

    I'm sure he was a very able officer, but, erm, that doesn't necessarily mean you can write well.
     
  9. Jonathan Ball

    Jonathan Ball It's a way of life.

    The literary Mogadon that is Beevor's Ardennes.
     
  10. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

    Agreed.

    I'm not unfamiliar with the conventions of military history, but even the set of maps couldn't enable me to keep track of who was where and why. I enjoyed the anecdotes, but it needed better structure: strict chronology does not always deliver the best narrative.

    Two older books that I've mentioned elsewhere as being disappointing: Cheshire VC by Paul Brickhill was a tabloidisation of a truly legendary figure that at no stage escaped superficiality and cliche.

    Memoirs by Field Marshal Alexander was a tepid and utterly unrevealing read. I had built up a picture from the diaries and memoirs of others that he was a great man with a sparking charm (although Alanbrooke didn't think him too bright), but I can only say that his writing utterly fails to convey this in a book that also suffers from a weird structure--some kind of Frankentext that doesn't know its purpose (military textbook, campaign report, personal reflection? Just stick it all together! Good selection of maps, mind you.)
     
  11. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

  12. Gage

    Gage The Battle of Barking Creek

    Never liked Len Deighton - The Battle of Britain.
    Some dodgy research that was later torn to pieces by other works.
     
  13. Peter Clare

    Peter Clare Very Senior Member

    Just taken delivery of "A Dictionary Of Coastal Command 1939-1945" - Geoff Simpson. very disappointing book, nothing at all like a dictionary. Just short stories re Coastal that can be read, seen in other publications with far more detail. I do have a paper that gives all Coastal Ops 1939-1945 I was hopping that this would compliment it but no way. £19:99 ill spent. We learn by our mistakes, or do we? A very misleading title.
     
    Last edited: Mar 6, 2017
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  14. Gage

    Gage The Battle of Barking Creek

    His Battle of Britain book was also disappointing.
     
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  15. minden1759

    minden1759 Senior Member

    Ten Armies in Hell by Peter Caddick-Adams is appalling. It attempts to tell the story of the four battles of Cassino but is full of typos, poor research and outright mistakes. Even the title is wrong. There were only two Armies in the whole of Italy: the American Fifth Army and the British Eighth Army. I am therefore not sure where he got the other eight from. P C-A is no Richard Holmes.

    Beevor's book on Spain was one of his first and quite unreadable but I suspect that after the roaring success of Stalingrad - which I did like, some opportunistic publisher decided to publish his entire back catalogue on the grounds that they would make money. It was worse than dreadful.

    Frank
     
  16. Chris C

    Chris C Canadian

    Ok so I'm not the only one who found Beevor's Ardennes hard to follow? Good to know!
     
  17. Charley Fortnum

    Charley Fortnum Dreaming of Red Eagles

    You'll love this then:
    The Mules of Monte Cassino: The Ground Level Truth About the Most Brutal and Unknown Battle of World War II: Jim DeFilippi: 9781492235088: Amazon.com: Books - you simply have to read the sample, it's truly risible. He even refuses to call Mark Clark by his real name throughout!
     
  18. Orwell1984

    Orwell1984 Senior Member

    Thanks for saving me some money :) Was on my wishlist and is now OFF my wishlist. A dictionary would have been useful. An anecdote collection not so much.
     
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  19. Swiper

    Swiper Resident Sospan

    Over time I've come to believe no book is completely without merit, but some certainly have far, far less than others. Usually even in the most dire publications one can find some small gem of research, or insightful comment.

    It is also evident which top bill historians have researchers write much of the book for them, don't check all the notes and cobble the remainder together. In case the prose can massively shift and its quite clear Researcher 4's material is clashing with Researcher 9's, but the author gives no stuffs.

    Caddick-Adam's Bulge history is completely impenetrable to me, not helped by no consistent writing or editing such as, 'Fourth Division', '4 Division', '4th Division', and then throwing nicknames in and all sorts, its terribly messy and was a key feature I put it down fairly quickly. Very disappointing.

    Beevor's Normandy book is just dire, but some nice reference material. Whereas Hasting's Overlord still has some merit as does d'Este, despite horrible flaws and still being sold as definitive histories when they are far from this. Later works by Hastings and Beevor have suffered terribly, and frankly gone off the wagon as far as any serious study is concerned.

    Anything purported to be by 'Bob Carruthers' is also on a list 'Duck, Dive, Dodge'.

    Oddly enough, I really enjoy Cooper's memoir ('Bitch' is just wonderfully written), but again the judgements on American armour are beyond problematic.

    ***

    Another whole area is of thin veteran testimony's which are turned into large publications with tons of recycled prose from other books and... clearly given no love by the publisher. Its sloppy at best, and frankly plagiarism. Meanwhile loads of academic PhDs are published for top dolla, which are again - objectively shit. I've read a few which are very, very poor quality and certainly should not be in print without extensive revision.
     
  20. Trackfrower

    Trackfrower Member

    Mein Kamp!

    Fairley tedious
     

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