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Books
“Churchill and the Jews” – by Michael J. Cohen
14
Sep
2017
1
By DANIEL MANDEL
As it stands, "Churchill and the Jews" offers a wealth of detail and analysis with some thought-provoking arguments and it scores a few hits. But it is ultimately defective in its judgment and marred by the prosecutorial tendency of discounting alternative interpretations of the evidence.
“Churchill, Roosevelt and Company: Studies in Character and Statecraft” – by Lewis E. Lehrman
06
Sep
2017
By WILLIAM JOHN SHEPHERD
Lehrman examines Churchill and Roosevelt through the teams they assembled: advisers, political officials and military leaders who worked for victory even as they argued over war strategy. His is not a history of the war, but an evaluation of people, decisions and events, a victory followed by a lost peace and decades of Cold War. A useful chronology and extensive endnotes, bibliography, and index are complemented by portrait photographs used as chapter headings, and two key appendices: a 1940 Roosevelt fireside chat, and Churchill’s victory speech in 1945.
“Churchill and the Bomb” – by Kevin Ruane
17
Feb
2017
By GRAHAM FARMELO
“There are many valuable accounts of Churchill’s nuclear thinking during his second premiership, notably in books by Klaus Larres and Peter Hennessey. But, for me, the account Ruane gives here is outstanding for the breadth of its scholarship, the richness of its narrative and the acuity of its judgements.”
“Churchill: The Life” – by Max Arthur
10
Feb
2017
By CHRISTOPHER HARMON
When a photo editor considers creating a Churchill “pictorial biography,” is he ever deterred by the stacks of just such books accumulating along shelves of libraries since the 1940s? One cannot be sure, but Max Arthur has been “toiling in the Churchill vineyard” for many years. There must be a hundred picture books dedicated to Churchill. After all, he lived his entire life in the era of the camera. In this new volume, about 260 pages hold photographs, a few in color. The large format gives great impact to many we’ve seen before, but the print quality, the lighting, is enhanced.
“Churchill & Ireland” – by Paul Bew
03
Feb
2017
By ROBERT COURTS MP
It is a good sign of a book’s quality when readers wonder why points so obvious have never before been made. Indeed it seems incredible that Churchill’s long, multi-layered and ambiguous relationship with Ireland has never before received the detailed and forensic treatment that Paul Bew now provides us. His book is readable, reliable, and brings new perspectives to the topic. For example, Lord Bew points out that Gallipoli, usually seen as an tragedy for the Australia New Zealand Army Corps, produced stirrings of nationhood in the Emerald Isle as great as in the Land of the Long White Cloud. Few historians have addressed this point before. Lord Bew reminds us that Churchill was intimately involved in the Curragh Mutiny, and the incredibly sensitive Irish negotiations up to the outbreak of the First World War—and that this formed his “training” in handling nationalist extremism and domestic political violence.
“I Love Churchill” – by Cate Ludlow
12
Jan
2017
By ANTOINE CAPET
One must not expect an austere academic compendium, but this does not mean that this small album would be out of place in a university library. Its attractive layout has a lot to say for it when one bears in mind how difficult is it sometimes to persuade students to read anything not on their syllabus.
“Churchill, Kitchener and Lloyd George” – by Steve Cliffe
09
Jan
2017
By PATRICK J. GARRITY
Journalist Stephen Cliffe has assembled a small volume that surveys the lives and careers of three World War I British leaders. Churchill may have been given pride of place in the book title because of his later prominence, or for alphabetic order; but in fact their relative importance in World War I was exactly the opposite.
“The Heroic Memory” – Ronald I. Cohen, editor
09
Jan
2017
By RICHARD M. LANGWORTH
Among the charms of this book are the speakers’ many references to Canada—tailored, of course, to their hosts, but nevertheless fitting, and not often acknowledged in histories we read today. Per capita, Canada was the largest contributor of fighting personnel, materiel and capital to the Allied cause in World War II. No nation was more generous, and by the time the war ended the feisty Canadian Navy was one of the largest and most effective afloat. Every speaker at Edmonton, in his or her own way, acknowledged the enormous debt we all owe to “The True North Strong and Free.”
“Churchill and Malta” – by Douglas Austin
09
Jan
2017
“Churchill and Malta’s War” – by Douglas Austin
22
Dec
2016
By DEBORAH WINSLOW NUTTER
With his third book on Malta, Douglas Austin depicts Churchill's great leadership and understanding of the geopolitical importance of the nation of Malta. In this deeply researched volume, the story of Malta's heroic struggle is told through Churchill's official Malta Papers and the vitality of Malta's role in supporting the Allied efforts.
“All Behind You, Winston” – by Roger Hermiston
05
Dec
2016
By RICHARD M. LANGWORTH
“Churchill’s titanic reputation,” Roger Hermiston writes, has tended to eclipse the vast cast of men—and women—who steered Britain through the worst crisis in her history. Nevertheless, and to his credit, Churchill put them together. In his book, "All Behind You, Winston," Hermiston chronicles not only how they worked in harness, despite manifestly different backgrounds, but how Churchill—whom many say had no concern for others—orchestrated their performance.
“Commander in Chief” – by Nigel Hamilton
19
Oct
2016
By PATRICK J. GARRITY
The sequel to Nigel Hamilton’s "The Mantle of Command", this book continues to explain, as he sees it, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s political and strategic thought and action in the Second World War. As one reviewer put it, Hamilton seeks to compose the memoirs FDR himself was never able to write.