Mad Mike's writing blog, book of the year 2018

Welcome friends, bookbloggers, avid readers alike, to my annual book of the year post. This isn't about books written or published this year, this is about the books I have read this year, and with dozens to choose from, it's no easy task.

I won't bore you with a big long list of all my reads from 2018, for that you can check out my historic posts or look at Amazon/Goodreads for my reviews, so without further ado:-

In at number five is, No Country for Old Men, Cormac McCarthy. Blog post 29/04/18
With its no nonsense approach to mass murder, a psychopathic hitman and the author's beautiful use of the Texan dialect, this action packed book is both fast and furious whilst quiet and threatening at the same time, and in spite of the sheriffs best efforts, you never stop believing that the hitman will win through in the end.

My number four is, The Twelve, by Justin Cronin. Blog post 25/06/18

Following on from The Passage was never going to be easy, but here, Justin Cronin takes things down a peg or two, goes back to where a dozen death row prisoners became the virals that go on to decimate the world. The world after the virus has moved on too, and the resulting climax, the build up to the gathering of The Twelve, where Amy makes her move, is soooooo good, the book just had to be in my top five.

In bronze position then: Ready Player One, by Ernest Cline. Blog post 24/11/18
In this futuristic look back at the past, Cline takes us to a dystopian world on the brink of destruction. The oil has gone, the crops have failed and the world is hungry and poor, so people choose to live as avatars in the alternate reality of, Oasis, a computer generated world that some never leave. With its heavy nod to the 80's, murder, global corporate corruption and a clear, 'root for the underdog' thread running throughout, Ready Player One is one of the most unique books I have ready this year.

So, this year’s runner up: All Hell let Loose, by Max Hastings. Blog post 20/08/18

To humanise the death of so many under such depraved circumstances and make it actually readable, is a testament to the true genius of this author, and his mix of first hand civilian accounts along with the well documented military events of the Second World War, gives the reader a true sense of the horrors that befell the world during those six long years. A classic must-read five star book.

And my winner, my favourite book of 2018: IT, by Stephen King.
'A coming of age, thriller, horror, murder mystery, sci-fi, history book, all rolled into one,' was what I said at the time, and I stick by that statement. There aren't enough superlatives in the English language to truly express my feelings for this absolute classic and to put that into context, I have read all 1166 pages of IT three times now and dare say I will read it again someday, for it is without compare. As I said in my 15/10/18 blog post: Put simply, one of the greatest books I have ever read.

All Hell Let Loose, book review. (Max Hastings) (Warning! Content some may find upsetting).

I don't know about you but I don't tend to read a lot of non-fiction, but there are exceptions, this being one of them.

Along with, James Holland and Antony Beevor, Max Hastings is one of only a few non-fiction authors I have read more than once, and for good reason. His narrative is a mixture of cold hard facts, the death, destruction and destitution that comes with war, spliced with first hand testimony of those that fought in the fields, the streets, on the landing grounds, and with growing confidence and strength in the air, (thank you Winston), so our island, Europe, and millions of others around the world, could be free from tyranny.

The author also gives voice to those who never took up arms, the housewives, the land girls, WRENS, and some of the millions of refugees, and although I'm not going to discuss the cruelty that fellow humans inflict on those with the wrong bloodline, ethnicity, creed or beliefs, in this blog post, (you can read the book for that), what I will say is that Max Hastings' writing and research is truly amazing, humanising a book that is so full of depravity, that at times I questioned whether I wanted to continue.

This book charts the whole of World War II, from the phoney war of 39’ – 40’, to Japan's capitulation in 1945, from the tiniest islands in the Pacific, to the blood drenched streets of Stalingrad, and it is horrific beyond imagination. To put some sort of perspective on that, I'm going to ask you to visualise something.

Think back to the last time you sat in a packed cinema, the last football game you attended, rock concert maybe, and picture the crowd. How many people were there? 500? 2000? Maybe it was a stadium with 50,000, or a music festival with 100,000. Whatever the amount, fix that crowd in your mind.

Now, picture this: Between the 3rd September 1939 (the day Britain and her allies declared war on Germany remember) to the 14th August 1945, that's 2172 days, (or 5 years, 11 months and 11 days), and with your crowd in mind, how many people do you think died for every one of those days, on average?

Not maimed, or injured, raped or beaten, not starved or displaced, but killed.

Twenty seven thousand! That's, twenty seven thousand people dying, every day, for two thousand seven hundred and seventy-two days, consecutively.

If you takes just one thing from this book, it's how powerful the human spirit is, that when there is no hope, when there is mass genocide, rape, torture, starvation and deprivation beyond anything we can ever imagine, men, women and children manage to cling on and survive.

LET US NOT FORGET THAT SHALL WE. LET US NOT DO THIS AGAIN.

Finest Years, Churchill as Warlord. (Max Hastings)

Well this was an interesting read. 

Not fast paced but interesting all the same. 

For example, who knew just how many mistakes one of the most famous men in history made, during his tenure as PM throughout World War II? 

Who knew how little the Americans were prepared to assist Britain, during our darkest hour?

Who knew how bad our armed forces performed through much of the conflict, compared to their Russian and German counterparts?

Winston Churchill, as we all know, was an exceptional orator, and from the moment he took his place at the PM's table, he inspired a nation with his speeches, some of which are as famous today as they were 70 years ago.

What he wasn't, was a military tactician. It didn't help that he had an army from the dark ages, using tactics from a different age. We shouldn't forget that the French army, (the largest in the world at the time), offered little resistance to Hitler's Wehrmacht during the battle for France, either.

The biggest shock for me though, was just how unhelpful and capitalistic America was when their supposed ally was in dire straits. How Churchill kept his head and continued to chip away at the then President and not just throw his toys out of the pram, underlines just what a great leader he was. 

How he kept his temper when our once enemy, turned ally, Stalin, started dictating the pace through 1944-45 and the Americans jump to his tune, is again, a mark of the man. A lesser man would have had a spat with the President, kicked off at the Russian, and who knows where that would have left Britain. 

Talking of capitalism, America had no intention of entering a war to assist an ally, (Britain and France declared war on Germany remember, when they invaded Poland [our ally] along with Russia, not for money, or profit, but because it was the right thing to do. America on the other hand, only entered the war when Japan attacked Pearl Harbour, and even then they continued with their lend lease agreement, which virtually bankrupted Britain by the wars end to the tune of £3 billion.  

A great ally then!

As usual, Max Hastings has done his research impeccably here, we have Russian diplomats with their opinions of Churchill, (not often favourable) Americans profiteering to the detriment of their ally, Churchill's highs and his many lows, his good side and his bad, but overall, this book gives the reader an in depth and probably as truthful a picture of the great man himself, Winston Churchill, as you are ever likely to read.

Four stars for this one then - it needed more pace to get five - but that is not a slur on the author, he did everything he could with the historical facts.

A fantastic 'Catastrophe'. Max Hastings does it again.

Well, Max Hastings' latest book Catastrophe, makes for horrific reading.

He takes the reader through the years that lead up to the 'Great War' as it was called at the time, and how just a few people in power, made the decisions that would end the lives of millions. 

The book looks at both the eastern front as well as the western conflict, it charts the inadequacies of the leading generals and how their incompetence lead to such devastation over the first few months of the conflict. On one day alone, 27,000 French men died, 27,000! This tally doesn't include the injured or the German, British, Russian, Austrian, Hungarian or any of the other nations that were fighting that day, just the French. 

The book finishes at the end of 1914, so if as a reader you want to know what happened throughout the war, you will need further reading, but if like me, you just want to find out how it all went so disastrously wrong, this is up to Max Hastings' normal high standard, and you won't be disappointed. 

A solid four stars.
Inspiration for the day goes to all those thousands of men and women who helped the wounded, lonely and bereaved during and after this dreadful catastrophe. 

Max Hastings' 'Catastrophe' gets an airing.

Being the one hundredth anniversary of the beginning of World War I, the amazing poppy installation at the Tower of London and armistice day this week, I couldn't think of a better time to start reading this book. So I've dug it out, tucked the dust jacket away for safe keeping and got stuck in. 

I've read a couple of Max Hastings' books before so I know I'm in for a great piece of historical non-fiction. I'll let you all know how it goes in a few weeks, when I've read it and had sufficient time for contemplation. 

Inspiration for the day goes to all the fallen:

Remember them, remember the brave, remember them, remember what they gave. http://t.co/GwlD8sK914