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om15
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Re: Book Thread

#21 Post by om15 » Mon Mar 18, 2019 9:17 pm

PN, I read "The Last Valley" some years ago, it fed my interest in this period, if you haven't read it recommend you read this before the Max Hastings book,

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/ ... ianreview9

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Re: Book Thread

#22 Post by Magnus » Tue Mar 19, 2019 8:21 am

There's a new bookshop opening about a 10 minute walk from the house. I'm quite looking forward to that.

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Re: Book Thread

#23 Post by Fliegenmong » Tue Mar 19, 2019 9:29 am

Jack Kerouac's "On the Road" I loved reding years ago....
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Re: Book Thread

#24 Post by Fliegenmong » Tue Mar 19, 2019 9:29 am

Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez was an interesting read
'
East West' by Salman Rushdie is a great collection of short stories
Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go... Oscar Wilde

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Re: Book Thread

#25 Post by Fliegenmong » Tue Mar 19, 2019 9:31 am

....And perhaps the most remarkable book I have ever read was "Immortality" by Milan Kundera, described on the blurb (?) as "One of those undefinable masterpieces that comes along every 20 years or so"
Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go... Oscar Wilde

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Re: Book Thread

#26 Post by Fliegenmong » Tue Mar 19, 2019 9:32 am

.... I gave a copy to an 'Academic' friend who lives across the street & he described it as a most extraordinary book...placing historical characters side by side & out of time and a middle story of unrelated characters that on one page come together in a most amazingly clever way....truly a marvellous example of the genre that is 'Modern Literature'
Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go... Oscar Wilde

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Re: Book Thread

#27 Post by Fliegenmong » Tue Mar 19, 2019 9:33 am

.....and I split my previous posts up so much 'cos I kept getting a Red message that said you can only post 400 characters and my post was 796 characters or similar....what's that about?....No where near 400 let alone 796!?!?!?!
Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go... Oscar Wilde

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Re: Book Thread

#28 Post by 603DX » Tue Mar 19, 2019 2:11 pm

om15 wrote:
Mon Mar 18, 2019 6:04 pm
I have just read the latest Max Hastings book, "Vietnam", covering the story from 1945 to 1975, as with everything that Max Hastings writes it is very well researched and written in a very readable way, I did not know very much about this war, but Hastings interviews all involved on both sides and then makes a final assessment with hindsight at the end.
Me too, my younger daughter gave me this for Christmas. Not a book reflecting the peace and goodwill that the season is associated with, but my word that fellow Hastings really knows his subject, and the work is an impressive testimony to his meticulous approach. He seems to cover most of what I recall was published in the UK press at the time of that dreadful conflict. The photograph of him smartly dressed and attentive at the January 1968 White House confrontation with the president Lyndon Johnson is evidence of his in-depth involvement at the highest level. He also put himself in harm's way during the endless patrols and skirmishes, and his text reflects the realities he experienced first hand, rather than the ill informed suppositions of some historians, blessed with 100% hindsight.

The shocking instances of the My Lai massacre, the self-immolation of priests, the innocent children fleeing a napalm drop, and the public execution of a VC suspect by a police chief are all included in these graphic pages. The truth hurts, as it should do when recounting those horrific events.

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Re: Book Thread

#29 Post by rgbrock1 » Tue Mar 19, 2019 2:24 pm

The book I'm currently reading, and completely enthralled by, is "Washington: A Life" by Ron Chernow.
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Re: Book Thread

#30 Post by CharlieOneSix » Tue Mar 19, 2019 5:40 pm

Due for imminent publication is "Forgotten Few, Naval Fighter Pilots in the Battle of Britain", by Paul Beaver.

Not to be confused with "The Forgotten Few" which is a book about Polish airmen in WW2 - "Forgotten Few" is a homage to the 57 naval pilots who flew in the Battle of Britain. For 20 years, the Admiralty and the Air Ministry did not recognise the valiant efforts of these young men – now historian Paul Beaver has compiled their biographies and explains the award of the coveted Battle of Britain clasp.

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Re: Book Thread

#31 Post by Stoneboat » Tue Mar 19, 2019 7:54 pm

I've just gotten into the novels of Steve Berry. He writes historical fiction - The Amber Room, The Fourteenth Colony - and other titles in a series about a US Treasury agent named 'Cotton' Malone who works for a fictional branch of the US Treasury called the Magellan Billet. Excellent reading, and Berry would appear to be an expert on the US Constitution. (I've verified some of the stuff he's written about the Constitution and he's correct.)

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Re: Book Thread

#32 Post by Hydromet » Wed Mar 20, 2019 1:52 am

Just finished reading one by one of my favourite authors, John Steinbeck, "The Wayward Bus". As always, he captures characters and the mood perfectly. Spoiler alert - it's a ...no, read it and find out for yourself.

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Re: Book Thread

#33 Post by 603DX » Wed Mar 20, 2019 5:16 pm

A Welsh colleague from our Bristol office saw my copy of "All Four Engines Have Failed" by Betty Tootell, on my desk in London. He asked if I was interested in aviation, and said that his uncle had written a book called "Handling the Big Jets". His uncle was David Davies, the one-time Chief Test Pilot of the Air Registration Board (now the CAA), responsible for certification testing of many civil aircraft. He recommended his uncle's book, so I obtained a copy of the third edition, reprinted in September 1997.

A fascinating read of what I now understand to be a very well-known textbook, with very lucid text, and clear diagrams, graphs and photographs. Although I'm "the wrong sort of engineer" and found some of it heavy going, it is so well put together that I even understood some of it!

My colleague said he had discussed some aspects of his uncle's responsibilities with him, and had learned that he carried out the certification testing of the DH Comet 1. The flight tests could not possibly have revealed the serious fatigue problems which later affected that aircraft type in service, because of the relative brevity of the flying regime for airworthiness certification. Although the flight testing had shown that careful handling at takeoff was called for, it did not inhibit issue of the certificate.

I found this interesting, because in 1959 I had visited RAE Farnborough as a member of the UCL Engineering Society, and we had been shown the Braithwaite sectional water tank enclosing a complete Comet 1 fuselage with wings protruding, used in the extensive investigations of metal fatigue led by Sir Arnold Hall. This had undergone thousands of pressurisation cycles, together with wing flexing by hydraulic jacks, and it had conclusively shown that the aircraft's fatigue life was very much less than intended. Water had been used for the pressurisation cycles in place of air, for safety reasons.

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Re: Book Thread

#34 Post by fin » Wed Mar 20, 2019 7:32 pm

Am currently on 11th book in a series about Inspector Rebus, written by Ian Rankin. I suspect those on t'other side of the pond would enjoy it even more than I am.
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Re: Book Thread

#35 Post by om15 » Wed Apr 03, 2019 8:34 pm

I have read all the Rebus books, also enjoyed the tv adaptations, John Hanna was a good Rebus but I think that Ken Stott is the best Rebus as I imagine him.

Just finished the latest William Boyd, "Love is Blind", recommended.

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