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Original poster

Ww1/ww2 fiction book recommendations

40 replies

Bluezoo123 · 16/11/2020 17:40

Wonder if anyone can help with any recommendations on ww1/ww2 fiction books? Especially if there's any newly released books.

OP posts:
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cdtaylornats · 03/12/2020 22:43

Edward Marston's Home Front Detective series

Original poster
Bluezoo123 · 01/12/2020 15:54

Thank you so much everybody. I think I am going to go with Birdsong.

OP posts:
Whenwillow · 01/12/2020 11:28

Another vote for Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks. I think it ticks all your boxes except being written recently.

Searchesforhipbones · 30/11/2020 21:34

@tobee

Just in case you might consider something humorous (maybe quite black humour), set in WWII, The Sword of Honour Trilogy by Evelyn Waugh.
This. It’s absolutely brilliant and dark and funny and lays open the sort of futility and waste.

On the other hand, We Must Be Brave broke my heart like nothing else I could ever imagine. So so so sad.

NomadNoMore · 30/11/2020 21:25

A Town Like Alice and Captain Corelli's Mandolin

rosegoldwatcher · 30/11/2020 21:13

Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks. Set in the trenches of WW1. There is a love story.

Fabulous.

I learnt so much reading this.

lastqueenofscotland · 30/11/2020 09:54

Another vote for all the light we cannot see

JiltedJohnsJulie · 20/11/2020 20:18

I've recently read the Nightingale but preferred the Alice Network so much more.

HMSSophie · 20/11/2020 08:55

Life and Fate by Vasilly Grossman. Russian journalist who was embedded with the Russian troops. Was at Stalingrad. Fabulous book.

The diaries of Victor Klemperer - a German Jew who kept a diary throughout WW2, is mind boggling

Something lighter would be the David Downing detective novels set in Berlin during WW2

Agreed about Birdsong and would add Parades End as a great novel.

Mypathtriedtokillme · 20/11/2020 08:06

Operation Mincemeat - is actually non-fiction but the idea and plan is so totally obscure it should be fiction.

tobee · 20/11/2020 05:49

Just in case you might consider something humorous (maybe quite black humour), set in WWII, The Sword of Honour Trilogy by Evelyn Waugh.

katy1213 · 20/11/2020 03:22

Allan Massie's Bordeaux series about a policeman in Vichy France is gripping; four books, if I remember rightly - I galloped through them.
Also, Village of Secrets by Caroline Moorehead.

IJumpedAboardAPirateShip · 20/11/2020 03:12

The Last Year of the War is another good one

katy1213 · 20/11/2020 03:11

Operation Heartbreak (Duff Cooper) or Little Boy Lost (Marghanita Laski) about a father's search for his son after WW2.

tobee · 20/11/2020 03:03

Yes to love element. Some gay and some heterosexual.

tobee · 20/11/2020 03:02

I also recommend both Pat Barker's trilogies; Regeneration and Life Class. Life Class bit more from a home front perspective but also on the western front.

Also Susan Hill's Strange Meeting

    We That Were Young by Irene  Rathbone

     Not So Quiet by Helen Zenner Smith

all set in World War I

And non fiction The Beauty and the Sorrow by Peter Englund - a collection of extracts of diaries and letters written by various people during World War I

Original poster
Bluezoo123 · 17/11/2020 22:49

Thank you so much everyone - you have given me lots to look at and I'm sure to pick a corker out of the suggestions. Do any of the books have a love story element to them which would appeal to a male reader?

OP posts:
PinkJellycat · 17/11/2020 22:17

Came on to suggest The Book Thief.

The Alice Network is a brilliant read.

Beecham · 17/11/2020 22:12

The Siege by Helen Dunmore. It's about the siege of Leningrad during the winter of 1941. Very very good.

PlanDeRaccordement · 17/11/2020 22:08

For Whom the Bell Tolls is good too.

LadyCatStark · 17/11/2020 20:47

It’s perhaps not the kind of thing you’re looking for but I’ve just finished Captain Tom’s autobiography and it was an incredible read. I love him even more now, he really is an incredible man.

cariadlet · 17/11/2020 20:42

Another vote for the Regeneration trilogy.
I'm currently reading Munich by Robert Harris and really enjoying it. I'm looking forward to V2 when it comes out in paperback. Fatherland (Robert Harris again) is a good alternative history.

eddiemairswife · 17/11/2020 20:38

The End of the Affair. Graham Greene. WW2
Journey's End. R.C.Sherriff. WW1

MatildaonaWaltzer · 17/11/2020 20:32

The order of the day by Eric Vuillard. It’s very short and very affecting - ww2 and an interesting slice of history about the German companies who used forced labour / collaborated (the utter twats who dressed Captain Tom in Hugo Boss for his photo shoot clearly need to read it)

Andante57 · 17/11/2020 20:29

I’d recommend The Heat of the Day by Elizabeth Bowen.
She’s a wonderful writer and she lived in London during the war so it’s really authentic.