Author on History Hack Podcast
Forged in Hell: The Gripping True Story of the Special Forces Heroes Who Broke the Nazi Stronghold. Damien Lewis. Citadel Press, October 22, 2024 (Advance Readers Copy). 400 pages.
Damien Lewis is a well known British military historian who has written many books about World War II, including The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, which was recently made into a major motion picture chronicling stories of the British Special Air Service (SAS) an elite special forces unit that was formed in 1941. The SAS specializes in behind the lines clandestine operations that include hostage rescue, counter-terrorism, sabotage, and intelligence-gathering. In July 1943, an SAS force was assigned to lead the invasion of Sicily, the "soft underbelly of Europe" as Winston Churchill called it, in order to dislodge Axis troops and to make a toehold for the largest invasion fleet ever assembled up to that time so that Allied troops could land and start making their way up the Italian boot. The SAS force was outnumbered at least 50 to 1 and had to deal with almost impregnable cliff-based defenses, and the fighting on the Italian peninsula would prove to be some of the most harrowing combat in the European theater, but the men of the SAS had their duty to fulfill.
Lewis is a great military historian, and his books read like novels. If you are a military buff, especially a WWII buff, this book is a must-read.
CBS Sunday Morning
Love and Whiskey: The Remarkable True Story of Jack Daniel, His Master Distiller Nearest Green, and the Improbable Rise of Uncle Nearest. Fawn Weaver. Melcher Media Inc., 2024. 376 pages.
While I've never been much a drinker, and I don't have a very discerning palate when it comes to alcohol, I was intrigued when I stumbled across a short video of Fawn Weaver discussing her new book. I read it, and I loved it. It's a great story of American history, but it's so much more. It's the story of an inspiring woman who should be an example of achievement, but I had never even heard her name until I stumbled on that video. It's a great story of historical and genealogical mystery solving. It's also a great story for aspiring entrepreneurs and business people, especially women and people of color.
Fawn Weaver's journey is incredible. The daughter of a Motown music songwriter and producer turned preacher and a minister's wife who published books on marriage and family, she left home and school at 15, lived in homeless shelters, and worked various jobs until, by age 20, she had become the head of a successful public relations firm. That success led to more success, with stumbling blocks along the way. One day, she happened to read a story about the relationship between Jack Daniel and his distilling mentor, Nearest Green. That story implied that the relationship had been mischaracterized by social media (gasps of shock and disbelief!), and she was hooked. She made it her mission to uncover the true story. She and her husband relocated from Los Angeles to Lynchburg Tennessee to do research. Three years later, she had turned the prevailing narrative on its head and discovered a totally unique, and previously unknown, episode of American history, and they founded a brand new distillery, named Uncle Nearest to honor the first known black master distiller in American history, to preserve and to tell the story. This truly is a great American story, accessible on many levels, even for people who aren't whiskey connoisseurs.
Book Talk
Twilight Man: Love and Ruin in the Shadows of Hollywood and the Clark Empire. Liz Brown. Penguin Books, 2021. 400 pages.
"In the booming 1920s, William Andrews Clark Jr. was one of the richest, most respected men in Los Angeles. The son of the mining tycoon known as "The Copper King of Montana," Clark launched the Los Angeles Philharmonic and helped create the Hollywood Bowl. He was also a man with secrets, including a lover named Harrison Post. A former salesclerk, Post enjoyed a lavish existence among Hollywood elites, but the men's money--and their homosexuality--made them targets, for the district attorney, their employees and, in Post's case, his own family. When Clark died suddenly, Harrison Post inherited a substantial fortune--and a wealth of trouble. From Prohibition-era Hollywood to Nazi prison camps to Mexico City nightclubs, Twilight Man tells the story of an illicit love and the battle over a family estate that would destroy one man's life." (Amazon description)
Very few people today have ever heard of either William Clark Jr or Harrison Post, but they were once well known, at least in Los Angeles society, and Post's struggles were covered in the press, long after the society pages lost interest. Author Liz Brown only stumbled onto the story because she is the great-grandniece of William Clark and found a photo of Post in her grandmother's home. The photo triggered memories of family whispers about her great uncle, and she set out to track down the real story of their relationship. In the process, she manages to take a self-absorbed bore and leech (Post) whose total livelihood and existence are dependent on his connections to other people and to make his life interesting, even making him a somewhat sympathetic character. She also takes the reader into the world of a rich and powerful family who played a significant role in the development of the western US, into Hollywood of the 1920s, and into the coded and hidden gay culture of the early 20th century. It's a story that involves people keeping secrets hidden (even if the secrets aren't really secret) and inventing and re-inventing themselves. The result is an interesting social history.
I stumbled onto this book. I like Colin Quinn, and I liked I liked his book The Coloring Book, It was a quick listen, obviously a project to keep him occupied during the pandemic. It is, as promised, a very mild roast of the fifty states, celebrating the quirks and differences that make each state unique. There are amusing bits and interesting bits. While there are occasional historical flubs, he is not a historian and is not writing history, but the reader can see that Quinn does have an appreciation for history. Try it out if you like Quinn as a stand-up.
Book Trailer
Follow the Stars Home. Diane C. McPhail. A John Scognamilio Book, 2024. 304 pages.
When I first encountered this work of historical fiction biography, I was intrigued. The protagonist of the story is Lydia Latrobe Roosevelt, the great grand-aunt of Theodore Roosevelt. I had never heard of her before, so I looked her up. What a life! She was the daughter of Benjamin Latrobe, one of the chief architects of the US Capitol and the White House. At age 13, she began "courting" Nicholas Roosevelt, a friend and business partner of her father. They married when she was 17, and he was 41. Roosevelt was an inventor and entrepreneur who partnered with Robert Fulton. Together, they pioneered the development of the steamboat, a huge advance in transportation that had a major impact on westward expansion. In order to generate publicity and to demonstrate the efficacy of the steamboat in 1811, he sailed the New Orleans down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, from Pittsburgh to New Orleans, in 14 days. It was an unprecedented journey, and Nicholas was not alone; Lydia accompanied her husband, 8 months pregnant and with a toddler in tow, breaking all gender barriers. Lydia was apparently an incredibly woman of her day.
Unfortunately, I am not a fan of romantic historical fiction, and this book -as much as I could read - is definitely in that genre. The title is a giveaway; it sounds like the title of a Hallmark Channel movie, even a Hallmark Christmas movie, and the book reads that way. I would have much rather read a straight biography or history. However, I know there is a market out there, and there are readers who will appreciate it. I am just not that reader,
