Specific wars and campaigns Books

In Great at Heart Gavin Long finally gets the biography he richly deserves.While Charles Bean is the subject of several major biographies, this is the first life story of his acolyte, war correspondent and editor and principal author of the official...

The members of the Australian battalion of Gull Force endured some of the harshest prisoner of war conditions of any Australian during the Second World War.In February 1942, on the remote island of Ambon in Indonesia, 1150 Australian soldiers were...

An astonishing tale of romance, resistance and bravery‘A sad and beautiful book, shining a light on quiet heroism in dark times.’ Lucy Adlington, New York Times bestselling author of The Dressmakers of Auschwitz Sabine’s War is the previously untold...

A Times History Book of the Year 2022From Sunday Times bestselling historian Saul David, the dramatic tale of the first American troops to take the fight to the enemy in the Second World War, and also the last. The ‘Devil Dogs’ of K Company, 3/5...

‘Lucid and damning … an absorbing – and infuriating – tale of complicity, coverup and denial’ PATRICK RADDEN KEEFE, author of EMPIRE OF PAINA groundbreaking investigation of how the Nazis helped German tycoons make billions from the horrors of the Third...

From the Arizona Congressman, a "powerful" and "searing" (PW) chronicle of the eternal bonds forged between the Marines of Lima Company, the hardest-hit unit of the Iraq WarAt first, they were “Lucky Lima.” Infantryman Ruben Gallego and his brothers in...

In 1914, despite being forbidden, many a Kiwi soldier's kitbag included a portable camera known as 'The Soldier's Kodak'. The images they recorded form the basis of this poignant collection of our soldiers from the First World War. In a major research...

‘Among the most moving documents I have read in years … You will not forget it’ Elie Wiesel From her small, sunny hometown between the beautiful Carpathian Mountains and the blue Danube River, Elli Friedmann was taken – at a time when most girls are...

"Magnificently researched, brilliantly written, Lethal Tides is immensely entertaining and reads like an action novel. Catherine Musemeche has brought to life the incredible work of the scientists and researchers who made such a remarkable...

(Previously published as ‘After the Flood’)Former RAF Tornado Navigator and Gulf War veteran John Nichol sets out on a personal journey to discover what happened to 617 Squadron after the flood. RAF 617 Squadron’s destruction of the dams at the heart of...

A gripping memoir by a former NZSAS commander on serving in Afghanistan over four deployments and operating at the edge of his limits 'Frighteningly, devastatingly real.' - The Post In 2011, following the Taliban siege on Kabul's Intercontinental Hotel,...

With a new foreword by Viet Thanh NguyenA beautiful commemorative edition of Dr. Martin Luther King's speech "Beyond Vietnam,” part of Dr. King's archives published exclusively by HarperCollins.At New York City's Riverside Church in 1967, Dr. King...

"A beguiling tale of espionage and double-dealing in the years leading up to World War II. ... Strap in for a narrative that demands a suspension of disbelief—and richly rewards it." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review); Best Books of February...

The Iraq War’s only living Medal of Honor recipient reveals the untold story of the remarkable brotherhood behind one of the war’s legendary acts of valor In 2004, he stormed an enemy stronghold to save his platoon. Fourteen years later, his unit...

‘Excellent’ Antony Beevor‘Saul David is a brilliant historian … In shocking and jaw-dropping detail, he brings a battle that deserves far greater prominence and understanding vividly back to life’ James Holland From award-winning historian Saul David,...

The Sunday Times bestseller‘An utterly engrossing book’ Nigella Lawson‘Remarkable and gripping’ Edmund de Waal'A near-perfect study of Jewish identity in the 20th century … I don’t hesitate to call it a masterpiece’ Telegraph After her grandmother died,...

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLERA masterly history of the Dambusters raid from bestselling and critically acclaimed Max Hastings. Operation Chastise was one of the most extraordinary episodes of the Second World War, yet it has also become one of the most...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The definitive history of combat aviation and fighter aircraft, from World War I to present INCLUDES 32 PAGES OF PHOTOGRAPHS AND 12 MAPSLords of the Sky is the “dramatic, fast-paced, and definitive" (Michael...

The gripping true story of the woman who became the Gestapo's most wanted spy In the early 1930s, Nancy Wake was a young woman enjoying a bohemian life in Paris. By the end of the Second World War, she was the Gestapo's most wanted person. As a naïve,...

A magisterial history of the greatest and most terrible event in history, from one of the finest historians of the Second World War. A book which shows the impact of war upon hundreds of millions of people around the world- soldiers, sailors and airmen;...

This epic book, spanning two continents, recounts the story of three generations of two families whose lives unexpectedly intersect in their adopted country. Beautifully capturing the loss faced when war dislocates families, it also tells of the...

Harry Peters - formerly Hermann Ludwig Pollnow, known to his family as Mutzi - was born in Berlin in 1920. As a teenager, he fled Nazi Germany and landed in rural Australia. Harry's parents, Max and Edith, stayed and perished in Nazi camps.This story, of...

In this collection Freda Hodge retrieves early voices of Holocaust survivors. Men, women and children relate experiences of deportation and ghettoisation, forced labour camps and death camps, death marches and liberation. Such eye-witness accounts...

The Ypres salient 'was the favourite battle ground of the devil and his minions' wrote one returned serviceman after the First World War. Few who fought in the infamous third battle of Ypres now known as Passchendaele in 1917 would have...

The Emperor's Grace is the story of the men of "C" Force the first contingent of Australian, British and Dutch POWs shipped from Singapore to Japan in November 1942 who worked in the Kawasaki Shipyard in Kobe before the...

Camouflage Australia provides international context for the historical circumstances and events of the organisation of camouflage in World War II in Australia and the Pacific region. She elaborates on the parallel involvement of British and American...

The internment camp on Rottnest Island, established for enemy aliens from Germany and Austria-Hungary during World War I, can be considered a historical oddity, not least because Indigenous prisoners were also held captive there by Australian soldiers...

In New Guinea’s jungles, a fierce battle turned the tide of the Pacific War—the first major land defeat for the unstoppable Japanese forces.By mid-August 1942, Imperial Japanese forces dominated the Southeast Asian and Pacific theatres, seemingly...

"From the skies over war-torn Europe to the opulent halls of English nobility, Edward Bagot's journey is a riveting testament to courage, heritage, and unwavering faith." Edward Bagot’s memoir offers a unique personal perspective on World War II,...

With the Australian troops crossing of the Kumusi River in mid-November 1942, after pushing the Japanese back along the Kokoda Track to the north coast of Papua New Guinea, the time had come to face the entrenched Japanese at their beachhead at Gona,...

Forgotten men and women from Australia in a forgotten war – Burma 1942-1945.If you didn’t know that Australians were involved in the longest campaign of WWII, in Burma, in what was called ‘a forgotten war’, this book illuminates the lost stories of their...

This fiercely funny memoir is set in Melbourne during the 1940s. The entrenched Protestant–Catholic divide of those times informs the narrative. Juxtaposed is the gulf between Melburnians and the thousands of Yanks stationed in their city following Pearl...

With the Australian troops crossing of the Kumusi River in mid-November 1942, after pushing the Japanese back along the Kokoda Track to the north coast of Papua New Guinea, the time had come to face the entrenched Japanese at their beachheads at Gona,...

The August Offensive or ‘Anzac Breakout’ at Gallipoli was an attempt to break the stalemate of the campaign. It saw some of the bloodiest fighting since the landing as Commonwealth and Turkish troops fought desperate battles at Lone Pine, German...

Commemorating the 80th Anniversary of the Battles in New Guinea David W. Cameron one of Australia's leading military historians new Kokoda Campaign series will take you from the Battle for Isurava to Port Morseby and finally the retaking of Kokoda. ...

This is the extraordinary story of the engagement between 250 young Australians, who enlisted in 1915 and died in the Battle of Fromelles of 1916, their families, and three British scientists.   In 2009, the bodies of these 250 soldiers were...

Commemorating the 80th Anniversary of the Battles in New Guinea David W. Cameron one of Australia's leading military historians new Kokoda Campaign series will take you from the Battle for Isurava to Port Morseby and finally the retaking of Kokoda. ...

War in the Pacific is a trilogy of books comprising a general history of the war against Japan; unlike other histories it expands the narrative beginning long before Pearl Harbor and encompasses a much wider group of actors to produce the most complete...

What kind of courage does it take for an ordinary married couple to confront the Nazi regime of Hitler’s vicious Third Reich?And why did two men betray their fellow secret agents after landing on American shores with the intention of carrying out...

…Well dear Jim it breaks my heart to write this letter. Our dear [brother] was killed yesterday morning at 5.30. The bullet killed him instantly and he never spoke a word. I had just left him and gone down the trench to see the other lads when I was...

So did not the atomic weapons bring about a great peace? Since the initial grateful acknowledgement of the success of the A-bomb attacks in ending World War II, there has been a steady reversal of opinion and sentiment: from a first hearty...

In 1999, idealistic 23-year-old Registered Nurse Sharon Bown left her comfortable family life in Tasmania and joined the Royal Australian Air Force with the aim of providing humanitarian aid to the world. Through her 16-year military career she deployed...

As soon as war broke out in September 1939, the conflict at sea began. It raged without respite until the unconditional surrender of Germany and Japan just under six years later. World War Two at Sea highlights the key moments in this absorbing story,...