Showing titles in World War II

A daredevil pilot in the famed 352nd Fighter Squadron, the author of this remarkable memoir bailed out of his burning Mustang two days after D-Day and was launched on a thrilling adventure on the ground in Occupied France.

A former CIA officer and curator of the CIA Museum unveils the shocking, untold story of Nobel Prize-winning author Ernest Hemingway’s secret life as a spy for both the Americans and the Soviets before and during World War II. While he was the curator of the CIA Museum, Nicholas Reynolds, a...

The true story of the bloodiest and most dramatic march to victory of the Second World War: the battlefield odyssey of a maverick U.S. Army officer and his infantry unit as they fought for over five hundred days to liberate Europe - from the invasion of Italy to the gates of Dachau. From...

One of the few RAF aircrew to play a central part in two of the Second World War's most momentous events, the Battle of Britain and D-Day, Cyril 'Frank' Babbage was a survivor. He wasn't just an immensely skilled pilot; he was also blessed with extraordinary good fortune.

The first and only memoir by one of the original Navajo code talkers of WWII. His name wasn’t Chester Nez. That was the English name he was assigned in kindergarten. And in boarding school at Fort Defiance, he was punished for speaking his native language, as the teachers sought to rid him of...

Alexander Rosenberg was a smart and curious teenager who spoke many languages, and lived a pampered life with his parents in a tranquil Czechoslovakian town. The rise of fascism and Nazi Germany causes his protected existence to collapse, alongside the illusion of secular Jewish assimilation in 1930s Europe. Using their last reserves of wealth and influence to escape extermination, the Rosenbergs go underground to avoid the Gestapo. Eventually exposed, captured, and taken to Buchenwald, the largest concentration camp in Germany, Alexander and his father collaborate to survive one day at a time

John Olivey, an officer in the Long Range Desert Group, saw action in the Western Desert, where he was awarded the Military Cross; he fought in the Dodecanese, for which he was decorated a second time; and saw active service on mainland Greece, and in Istria. In autumn 1943, he was deployed to the Aegean and in October tasked with leading 'Olforce' in an ill-conceived operation to take the island of Levitha. Of some fifty LRDG, he was one of only seven to avoid capture. During the battle for Leros in November, he commanded X2 Patrol at Clidi, a key hilltop position. 

No Demon of Darkness is not a chronicle of violent clashes with the Luftwaffe's bombers over England; it is the tale of a young pilot and the challenges he faced in learning to fly, and in flying heavy fighters such as the Bristol Beaufighter and De Haviland Mosquito. It is also about setbacks and successes. Above all, it is about what it often meant to be an inexperienced operational pilot in wartime.

As a teenager Audie Murphy left his home in Texas to join in the fight against the Nazis. By the end of the war, he had fought in the bloody battle of Anzio, helped liberate Rome, marched his way across France, repelled German counterattacks in Alsace, before finishing in Germany. He was wounded three times, killed over two hundred enemies, and won every medal for valor that the United States had to offer.

A main architect of the Holocaust, Heinrich Himmler was perhaps one of the most ruthless men that ever lived. For most, this would be hyperbole, but for Himmler, such words would seem like a rather apt description.

Dopo l'8 settembre 1943 uno sparuto gruppo di studenti vicentini, guidato da un giovane professore antifascista, si dà alla macchia sull'altopiano di Asiago per tentare di organizzare la Resistenza. La voce narrante – autoironica, commossa e marcatamente autobiografica – dipana un lungo filo di agguati, rastrellamenti, uccisioni, "fughe" e "atti di valore" di cui i ragazzi sono protagonisti e vittime.

From the beginning, it was clear that Ralph Nutter was an exceptional navigator. Rapid promotion followed when he was assigned as Maj. Gen. Curtis the Eagle LeMay's personal navigator. Later, he was picked by Maj. Gen. Haywood Possum Hansell, the 20th Air Force Commander, to be his personal navigator. The author's vivid recollections of those halcyon years make for exciting, informative listening.

In the tradition of ‘Agent Zigzag’ comes a breathtaking biography of WWII’s ‘Scarlet Pimpernel’ as fast-paced and emotionally intuitive as the best spy thrillers. This celebrates unsung hero Robert de La Rochefoucauld, an aristocrat turned anti-Nazi saboteur, and his exploits as a...

At 9:20 a.m. on the morning of May 30, General Groves receives a message to report to the office of the secretary of war “at once.” Stimson is waiting for him. He wants to know: has Groves selected the targets yet? So begins this suspenseful, impeccably researched history that draws on new...

INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER The masterful narration of a daughter's decades-long quest to understand her extraordinary mother, who was born in Lenin's Soviet Union, served as a combat soldier in the Red Army, and endured three years of Nazi captivity—but never revealed her darkest secrets. As...

Train to Nowhere is a war memoir seen through the sardonic eyes of Anita Leslie, a funny and vivacious young woman who reports on her experiences with a dry humour, finding the absurd alongside the tragic. Daughter of a baronet and first cousin once removed of Winston Churchill, she joined the Mechanised Transport Corps as a fully trained mechanic and ambulance driver during WWII, serving in Libya, Syria, Palestine, Italy, France and Germany.

In mid-1943 James Megellas, known as “Maggie” to his fellow paratroopers, joined the 82d Airborne Division, his new “home” for the duration. His first taste of combat was in the rugged mountains outside Naples. In October 1943, when most of the 82d departed Italy to prepare for the D-Day...

Ernest "Andy" Andrews's company, part of the 1st Infantry Division, departed England on the evening of June 5. Fighting in Normandy, Andy was nicked by a bullet and evacuated to England in late July when the wound became infected. He rejoined H Company in time to fight in the Battle of the Bulge. Andy's outfit ends the war fighting in Czechoslovakia, where Andy witnesses the German surrender in early May. The war shaped Andy's postwar life in countless ways. This vivid firsthand account takes the listener along from Normandy to victory with Andy and his machine-gun crew.

Omar Nelson Bradley was the youngest and last of nine men to earn five-star rank and the only army officer so honored after World War II. This new biography by Steven L. Ossad gives an account of Bradley’s formative years, his decorated career, and his postwar life. Bradley’s decisions shaped the five Northwest European Campaigns from the D-Day landings to VE Day. As the man who successfully led more Americans in battle than any other in our history, his long-term importance would seem assured.

The complete war memoirs of the resistance leader Charles de Gaulle, who led France out of its darkest hour during the Nazi occupation during World War II. “Faced with the political disaster, I had to become France.” This was how Charles de Gaulle answered the call of history. One of the few...