Military History Studies, Fiction and Fantasy Book Reviews

Nicholas and Alexandra by Robert K Massie

2009-09-23T10:10:00.003+10:00

Nicholas and Alexandra by Robert Massie is a wonderful read. Not only the book is full of historical information, it is also a compassionate story about family, love and war.

Nicholas and Alexandra was published in 1967 during the Soviet era. In Russia at that time this type of material would be banned. Massie went through great trouble and painstaking research to write this book.

Through this book the reader learns a great deal of the imperial family's day to day life, their outings, friends and hobbies. We also see that this family is no different to the normal family you would normally meet. The reader learns about the main character, czar Nicholas II just an ordinary man, loves his family very much and perhaps he is not turning out to be a great ruler, but a loving father and husband.

Great Russian historical cities St Petersburg, Kiev, Moscow and interesting people like Gregory Rasputin, Czar Nicholas II, Tsarevich Alexis, Empress Alexandra, Lenin, Yakov Yurovsky, all play major role in deciding the future of Russia. The reader gets to meet these people and visit places like the great hall of the Winter and Alexander palace. Come to grips of what the first World War was like and the effect it brought on the Royal family. While the war was raging across Europe the provisional government and the Bolsheviks were trying to abdicate the czar.

We learn about the czar's abdication and imprisonment and find out about the unhappy ending that awaited the Romanov's.

The book is written in great style and easy to read manner. You will not find many confusing dates and battle plans, but what you will find is a great story written with extensive research and passion. At first the book looks very thick with small writing and well over 600 pages. Don't be fooled by it because over 100 pages of the book is Massie's research notes. Overall the book is about 507 pages and a fast page turner.

I cannot stress enough how much I enjoyed this book. I learned a lot more about WWI from this book than I did from any other written on the subject. Massie got a unique way with words and knows how to keep the reader interested by combining history with a great story.
5 out of 5 stars

The Romanov Prophecy by Steve Berry

2009-08-15T19:21:00.009+10:00

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, in fact this book inspired me to read up more on the last imperial family of Russia. After I finished reading it I ordered "Nicholas and Alexandra" by Robert K Massie and his second book on the same subject " The Romanovs: The Final Chapter". A review coming soon.

Ok, in my opinion The Romanov Prophecy has some good points and some main bad points. First, I really enjoyed the historical information in the book, you could tell that the author has extensive knowledge on the subject. I also enjoyed the idea of monarchy returning back to present day Russia, it is something that makes you think what if. The things I didn't like about the book is its main character with his superhuman capabilities to escape, outsmart, dodge and get out of the way just in time from one of the most dangerous outlaw groups in the world the Russian mafia .

Miles Lord who is an American lawyer was sent to Russia along with his boss to help coordinate the delegation and to become part of history in the making of an election to pick the new Tzar of Russia. During his stay in Russia, Miles opens a Pandora box and gets mixed up in a twist of events that lead to many assassination attempts by the Russian mafia to kill him. Miles escapes about five murder attempts in one day and continues on all the way through the book outsmarting and making the Russian bad guys look like dumb fools. In this book the author exaggerates about Russia and Russian poverty and the mafia.

Without giving too much away the plot sounds very cheesy and unrealistic, even for historical fiction I expected more from this book. As I mentioned before the historical facts mixed with fiction about the demise of the Romanov family is written very well and captures the readers imagination and again the "what if" pops up when reading these events.

At some point in the book the author uses Russian words to give the reader the feeling that the events are happening in Russia, however these words are not accurate. For example the word chernie is used to describe Miles Lord an African American. The word cherni means black, chernie is plural and means blacks which does not make sense when you only talking about one person.

I think the story had great potential if it was better written but lost me a little in its unrealistic plot. Besides all that, I think the book is readable and is a page turner. A recommendation for readers interested in Russian history with a Davinci code twist.

3 out of 5 stars

One Soldier's War in Chechnya by Arkadii Babchenko

2009-05-19T11:30:00.000+10:00

This is a great book. Information on Russian modern war conflicts is hard to come by. This book gives a reader an understanding of what life is like in the modern Russian army. The Chechnya conflict was one of the most horrific modern wars ever fought. Hair raising accounts the author provides of his day to day life where hard beatings, starvation, dysentery, desertion and knowing that your life is worthless was part of army life.
Babchenko took note of everything that he saw, heard and thought during this horrific period and for the first time leads the reader into his world of what was war like, the emotions felt and the hardship of loosing friends in battle, thinking you could be next.
Lets not forget this is not WWI or WWII accounts, this is something that happened not even a decade ago. The events descried in the book will make the reader to stop and think and eventually come to grips with what has been written. Coming from an ex Soviet Union I felt a personal attachment for this book also the Author being only a year older than I'm.
I would recommend this book to anyone interested in military history especially Russian modern wars.
The reason for giving four stars instead of five is that I found the text is a little hard to follow as it is written in a journalist format. The book is a collection of notes and was not meant to be a book as Babchenko stated, however besides this small problem I think the book was put well together and quite readable.
I give this book 4 out of 5 stars.

Raven (Blood Eye) by Giles Kristian

2009-05-15T14:01:00.000+10:00

This is the first book in the trilogy of Vikings in England. A fast paised action adventure in the tradition of Bernard Cornwell's historical fiction books. If you enjoy Bernard Cornwell's historical fiction you will enjoy this book. I bought this book because it had great reviews by Bernard Cornwell himself, I'm a big fan of his stories.
One of the most interesting things about reading historical fiction is that later you would want to go and read the actual non fiction history. Having read most of Cornwell's historical fiction novels (except Sharpe stories) I was armed with some knowledge about dark ages and the Viking invasion of England. The only difference with this story is that Kristian tells the story of Norsemen, while Cornwell's story involves the Danes. Norsemen and Danes were both part of the great invasion of England, however as Cornwell describes that the Danes played a bigger part of the Invasion. Kristian's story is of the lesser known Norsemen who invaded England.
I don't want to compare this book too much to Cornwell's books because this book is its own creation and what a good creative story it is. I never read a book that describes battles in such brutality with foul language and yes there is an occasional f?** word.
All the ingredients are there for a good story and still stay true to the setting of 9th century England. This book provides a good map which is easy to understand so you can follow the wolf pack on the adventure across the English land.
The story flows quite well, sometimes a little too fast. It is a story about a boy named Osric apprentice to a mute old carpenter, who witnesses his village burned to the ground by these mysterious Norsemen, they end up sparing his life and taking him and his mute companion prisoner, but a great adventure awaits them across the English land where trouble lurks. Osric becomes very compassionate with the Norsemen and sees their pagan way of life will make him a great warrior.He must choose to pledge his life to the leader of the group Sigurd the Lucky or resist these barbarians. The choice is easy as Osric's past comes to haunt him about his identity. Here begins a great adventure across the stormy seas, great Viking ships and lots of brutal battles. Viking gods will clash against the Christian god, but in 9th century England Vikings are not the only enemies of Anglo-Saxon people.
One small problem I had with this book is that the story moved a bit too fast. I felt that Osric's character need more time to develop. I felt that he accepted his captors without too much resistance at all, but I guess its a small price to pay for such a great story from a new talent. The author has done a lot of research about the Viking mythology and mentions different gods throughout the story so if you are interested in knowing more detail about the gods mentioned in the story turn to the appendix at the beginning of the book for more information, also you will find there names of all the major characters so you know where they belong in the story.
At the moment this book only comes in hard cover, I would recommend to get this one because the cover itself is breathtaking. So if you collect books the hard cover is the way to go.
Good story telling in high caliber from this new author. I'm eagerly awaiting for the second book.
I will give it 4 out of 5 stars.