Here are 82 books that Call-Sign Kluso fans have personally recommended if you like
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I come by my interest in history and the years before, during, and after the Second World War honestly. For one thing, both my father and my father-in-law served as pilots in the war, my father a P-38 pilot in North Africa and my father-in-law a B-17 bomber pilot in England. Their histories connect me with a period I think we can still almost reach with our fingertips and one that has had a momentous impact on our lives today. I have taken that interest and passion to discover and write true life stories of the war—focusing on the untold and unheard stories often of the “Average Joe.”
This book is a gift to readers of World War II history. I had had it on my to-be-read list for years and finally opened the page earlier this year.
The prose is heart-grabbing and nerve-rattling and helped me better understand the unfathomable—flying in a WWII-era bomber, my hands frostbitten and bleeding, a tiny piece of shrapnel lodged in my eye as I try to reassemble my plane’s radio. Far from just another story of young men doing their duty to their country.
THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER: “Beautifully told.”—CNN • “A remarkable story...worth retelling and celebrating.”—USA Today • “Oh, it’s a good one!”—Fox News
A “beautiful story of a brotherhood between enemies” emerges from the horrors of World War II in this New York Times bestseller by the author of Devotion, now a Major Motion Picture.
December, 1943: A badly damaged American bomber struggles to fly over wartime Germany. At the controls is twenty-one-year-old Second Lieutenant Charlie Brown. Half his crew lay wounded or dead on this, their first mission. Suddenly, a Messerschmitt fighter pulls up on the bomber’s tail. The pilot is German…
A moving story of love, betrayal, and the enduring power of hope in the face of darkness.
German pianist Hedda Schlagel's world collapsed when her fiancé, Fritz, vanished after being sent to an enemy alien camp in the United States during the Great War. Fifteen years later, in 1932, Hedda…
Mike Guardia is an Amazon Top 100 Bestselling Author and military historian. A veteran of the United States Army, he served six years on active duty (2008-2014) as an Armor Officer. He has written and lectured on various topics of modern military history, including guerrilla warfare, air-to-air combat, and World War II in the Pacific. He holds a BA and MA in American History from the University of Houston.
Unsung Eagles is an intimate tour-de-force of air combat in World War II told, literally, from the perspective of the pilots themselves. The pilots who provided their stories for this book were all unassuming men from humble backgrounds. Yet, after Pearl Harbor, they gladly raised their right hands and swore an oath to defeat the Axis Powers. These brave young men flew various combat missions over the European and Pacific theaters. Yet, after the war, they came home to resume their normal lives and said nary a word about their wartime service, until now.
The nearly half-million American airmen who served during World War II have almost disappeared. And so have their stories. In Unsung Eagles, award-winning writer and former fighter pilot Jay Stout has saved an exciting collection of those accounts from oblivion. These are not rehashed tales from the hoary icons of the war. Rather, they are stories from the masses of largely unrecognized men who in the aggregate actually won it. These are "everyman" accounts that are important but fast disappearing. Ray Crandall describes how he was nearly knocked into the Pacific by a heavy cruiser's main battery during the Second…
Mike Guardia is an Amazon Top 100 Bestselling Author and military historian. A veteran of the United States Army, he served six years on active duty (2008-2014) as an Armor Officer. He has written and lectured on various topics of modern military history, including guerrilla warfare, air-to-air combat, and World War II in the Pacific. He holds a BA and MA in American History from the University of Houston.
Few Americans know that the US Air Force kept its own secret squadron of MiG aircraft. The secretly acquired Soviet MiGs were used as mock aggressors at Nellis Air Force Base so that American pilots could practice their dogfighting skills against the very planes they would see in the skies over Vietnam.
From the late 1960s until the end of the Cold War, the United States Air Force acquired and flew Russian-made MiG jets, culminating in a secret squadron dedicated to exposing American fighter pilots to enemy technology and tactics.
Red Eagles tells the story of this squadron from the first tests of MiGs following the Vietnam War when the USAF had been woefully under-prepared in aerial combat. These initial flights would develop into the "black" or classified program known internally as Constant Peg.
At a secret air base in Nevada, ace American fighter pilots were presented with a range of differnet…
Sine, a professor of creative writing, accompanies Sam, a neuroscientist, on a conference trip to a Hotel Castle. Sam wants to present a new device, the "monitor." Sine hopes to recover from tending to her mother who just passed away.
When they arrive, Sine is in a dream-like state. Real…
Mike Guardia is an Amazon Top 100 Bestselling Author and military historian. A veteran of the United States Army, he served six years on active duty (2008-2014) as an Armor Officer. He has written and lectured on various topics of modern military history, including guerrilla warfare, air-to-air combat, and World War II in the Pacific. He holds a BA and MA in American History from the University of Houston.
Few histories have been written about the F-16, much less from the perspective of the pilots who flew it in combat. Dan Hampton offers his unique insights into the world of American airpower. From Desert Storm to Operation Iraqi Freedom, Hampton logged 608 flight hours across 151 combat missions. From this deftly written account, we relive the days of “Shock and Awe” from the pilot’s seat.
"Viper Pilot" is the high-octane memoir of one of America's elite aviators: a twenty-year battle-seasoned pilot who flew 151 combat missions in the world's most iconic fighter plane - the F-16 Fighting Falcon - the Viper as its pilots call it. A fighter pilot who came of age at the end of the Cold War, Dan Hampton was one of the flyers scrambled into the skies on 9/11. With the onset of the Iraq War, he saw extensive action and was one of the Wild Weasels, a select cadre of highly trained, innovative, and gutsy fighters who flew into hostile…
As a refugee myself, I was attracted to read about the lives and experiences of other refugees, not merely those from my own community or background, but especially those from other backgrounds–which is probably reflected in the books that I’ve chosen for my list.
Set in former Yugoslavia, this powerful novel follows a girl whose only chance of survival is to escape war and rebuild a life elsewhere.
I found the way the author tells this story beautiful, even though the story is tragic, and describes the complexities of civil strife as well as their impact on ordinary people living in a country that is now split into Bosnia, Croatia, and Serbia.
“Fiction does give you a capacity for empathy,” says the author. It should–and I found that this one does.
LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2016
Growing up in Zagreb in the summer of 1991, 10-year-old Ana Juric is a carefree tomboy; she runs the streets with her best friend, Luka, helps take care of her baby sister, Rahela, and idolizes her father. But when civil war breaks out across Yugoslavia, football games and school lessons are supplanted by sniper fire and air raid drills.
The brutal ethnic cleansing of Croats and Bosnians tragically changes Ana's life, and she is lost to a world of genocide and child soldiers; a daring escape plan to America becomes her…
I am a veteran novelist who believes this over all else: The opening is everything. This has been my modus operandi as a storyteller for over thirty books, as well as a half dozen screenplays. I love a great opening. It is how a reader or viewer will subconsciously decide whether they will devote themselves to a story. It is the first kiss. The first shot over the bow. The ignition, the countdown, and the launch. It is the alpha and omega… because the beginning dictates the ending. Oh my, how I love the beginning!
“The man with ten minutes to live was laughing.” Thus begins one of the greatest war novels by one of the greatest living writers of espionage thrillers.
Frederick Forsyth’s epic story of the Persian Gulf War mingles fact with fiction, and never lets up its humming current of suspense. Incidentally, that laughing man was Gerald Vincent Bull, a real historical figure who invented a super-gun for Saddam Hussein. Not exactly the safest line of work.
His assassination triggered a Rube Goldberg series of events that only Forsyth would have the… well… foresight to use as the first sentence in this violent, epochal tale.
From behind-the-scenes decision making of the Allies to the secret meeting of Saddam Hussein's war cabinet, from the brave American fliers running dangerous missions over Iraq to a heroic young spy planted deep in the heart of Baghdad, Forsyths incomparable storytelling keeps the suspense at a breakneck pace.
Peopled with vivid characters, brilliantly displaying the intricacies of intelligence operations moving back and forth between Washington and London, Baghdad and Kuwait, and revealing espionage tradecraft as only Frederick Forsyth can, The Fist of God tells the utterly convincing story of what may actually have happened behind the headlines.
In an age of splendor, a heretic king strips Egypt bare—forcing his queen to quell rebellion and plunging his children into a conspiracy against the crown.
Salvation in the Sun follows Nefertiti as she ascends the throne beside Pharaoh Amenhotep—soon to become Akhenaten—just as he declares war on Egypt’s ancient…
Spending four years writing a memoir—and several more editing it—made me realize how selective and fluid memory is. Our stories shift over time, shaped by distance, perspective, and even small sensory triggers that can surface long-forgotten moments.
These five books blur the line between fiction and memoir, each exploring how lived experiences are remembered and retold. They examine not just events, but the author’s perspective on them—and what that reveals about their inner world. From a child’s heightened sensitivity, to the thrill-seeking of a war correspondent, to the lasting impact of a parent’s murder, each work shows how memory shapes both a life and the story we tell about it.
Anthony Lloyd has spent his time as a war correspondent in horrific war zones like Bosnia Herzegovina and Chechnya and seen some of the worst conditions that modern war and ethnic hatreds have to offer.
Rather than just reporting on the experience, he gives you a sense of what it feels like to be in those situations, and then he goes further. While it has become common to talk about adrenaline junkies, Lloyd ups the ante by describing the heroin addiction he reverts to whenever he returns to England between assignments, and the perspective this brings to the narrative takes it to an entirely deeper level.
This book engaged me at an emotional and psychological level in a version of life that I could otherwise never even imagine. For me, that is exceptional writing.
My War Gone By, I Miss It So is a uniquely powerful piece of writing, unparalleled in the genre. Ex-infantry officer Anthony Loyd arrived in the Balkans hoping to become a war correspondent. He wanted to see `a real war', and in Bosnia he found one. The cruelty and chaos of the conflict both appalled and embraced him - the adrenaline lure of the action perhaps the loudest siren call of all. In the midst of the daily life-and-death struggle among the Serbs, Croatians and Bosnian Muslims he was inspired by the extraordinary human fortitude he discovered. But returning home,…
I’m an OG ATLien (born in Atlanta, Georgia) and served in the US Marine Corps and the US Army. I hold a degree from Kennesaw State University and taught high school social studies from 2004 - 2006, before my military reenlistment which jumpstarted the events in my memoir.
It’d be hard to imagine a former marine, who served during the 1980’s or 1990’s, not identifying with Anthony Swofford’s Jarhead.
Swofford and his unit land in the desert sand to kickoff Operation Desert Shield, and months of boredom, anxiety, and self-doubt blanket the men. This isn’t your typical “shoot ‘em up bang bang” war diary. In fact, Swofford is a sniper who never fires a shot.
But months of patrolling an empty desert, living “the suck” life, eagerly awaiting a war to start, and the fear of the unknown drag on these marines and test their sanity. After months of grinding, the Gulf War begins then quickly ends.
Anthony Swofford's Jarhead is the first Gulf War memoir by a frontline infantry marine, and it is a searing, unforgettable narrative. When the marines -- or "jarheads," as they call themselves -- were sent in 1990 to Saudi Arabia to fight the Iraqis, Swofford was there, with a hundred-pound pack on his shoulders and a sniper's rifle in his hands. It was one misery upon another. He lived in sand for six months, his girlfriend back home betrayed him for a scrawny hotel clerk, he was punished by boredom and fear, he considered suicide, he pulled a gun on one…
I have had the great luck to combine my love of writing with my love of photography that in turn combines my great loves of art and of science. Oh, I have another love: to share what I know; some call it teaching. That is why I’ve lectured and talked more times than I can remember, and written millions of words in magazine features and forty books. In the early years, my attention centred on photographic techniques, but I’ve become increasingly focused on creativity and the conditions that enable full expression of the individual. My choice of books refracts that range—I hope—into a coherent spectrum of approaches.
I admit drawing a big breath before buying this book. At nearly 1200 pages of dense type, it’s no lightweight.
But years before, I had admired Fisk’s war reporting. Here, I found all the qualities I remembered: nuanced geopolitics with humanity, brutal honesty with subtle observation, pointed modern parallels from an erudite grasp of history. Then I delight in the sheer virtuosity of word craft: not surprising from someone who wrote thousands of words to deadline, sometimes shouting his despatches against cannon fire over stuttering phone lines.
Above all, I find myself repeatedly inspired by his ability to observe and note every tiny yet resonant detail: from the serial number on a rocket fragment to the shoes worn by an official.
A sweeping and dramatic history of the last half century of conflict in the Middle East from an award-winning journalist who has covered the region for over forty years, The Great War for Civilisation unflinchingly chronicles the tragedy of the region from the Algerian Civil War to the Iranian Revolution; from the American hostage crisis in Beirut to the Iran-Iraq War; from the 1991 Gulf War to the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. A book of searing drama as well as lucid, incisive analysis, The Great War for Civilisation is a work of major importance for today's world.
Born the heir of a master woodcutter in a queendom defined by guilds and matrilineal inheritance, nonbinary Sorin can’t quite seem to find their place. At seventeen, an opportunity to attend an alchemical guild fair and secure an apprenticeship with the…
The greatest influence on my interest in the theme of war is, of course, my father. Only later, when I became involved with the FEPOW groups, I heard the real stories of what happened to them as individuals, as well as the poor treatment of families back home in Britain. My book is based on their stories. However, this interest also spread to other areas as I read about the history of war while studying literature and, later, the work of various official War Artists. In all of it, the despair and hopelessness comes through, definitely not any sense of the ‘glory’.
I am sure many will remember seeing the news footage on TV showing the little boy standing next to Saddam Hussain during the first Gulf War. He was, of course, not there by choice, as he was actually one of the hostages being held at the time. It was an interesting propaganda exercise, especially as Saddam tried to encourage Stuart to get closer but he was clearly not having it! From a PR perspective, it was unsuccessful and was not accepted as a positive image by those in the West.
This book is written by his mother and describes just how traumatic the experience was for all the family as well as all the other families held hostage at the time. As the final book in my selection, it completes the theme of the futility of war and its impact on the individuals closest to the action.
On 23 August 1990, the world was outraged when five-year-old Stuart Lockwood was used in a publicity stunt by Saddam Hussein. This work is based on his mother's diary of their imprisonment in Baghdad during the Gulf War, and their treatment during Iraq's human shield policy.
