By Kevin Seabrooke

Full Reviews

Defenders of the Reich: The Luftwaffe’s War against America’s Bombers (Robert Forsyth, Osprey Publishing, New York, NY, 480 pp., glossary, maps, 16-pages b&w photos, Nov. 4, 2025 $40 HC)

A Task Force Called Faith: The Untold Story of the U.S. Army Soldiers Who Fought for Survival at Chosin Reservoir—and Honor Back Home (Steve Vogel, Lyons Press/dist. Simon & Schuster, 500 pp., Nov. 25, 2025 $39.95 HC)

Pearl Harbor: Japan’s Greatest Disaster (Mark Stille, Osprey/Bloomsbury Publishing, 368pp., 16-pages b.w photos, Nov. 4, 2025 $35 HC)

Crossing the Pass of Clouds: An Army Photographer’s Vietnam Journal (Lon Holmberg, University Press of Mississippi, Jackson, MS, 196 pp., 147 b&w photographs, 2025, $40 HC)

The View from My Foxhole: A Marine Private’s Firsthand World War II Combat Experience from Guadalcanal to Iwo Jima (William Swanson, Permuted Press, Brentwood, TN, 176 pp., 2022 $26 HC)

Chain of Fire: The Siege of Khartoum and the Campaign of Egypt and the Sudan (Peter Hart, Pegasus Books/dist. Simon & Schuster, New York, NY, 464pp., maps Oct. 7, 2025 $35 HC)

Ring of Fire: A New History of the World at War: 1914 (Alexandra Churchill & Nicolai Eberhols, Pegasus Books, New York, NY, 448 pp., maps, Aug. 5, 2025 $35 HC)

Short Bursts

King of Kings: The Iranian Revolution: A Story of Hubris, Delusion and Catastrophic Miscalculation (Scott Anderson, Double- day, New York, NY, 512 pp., Aug. 5, 2025 $35 HC) This winner of the 2025 Kirkus Prize for nonfiction is a compelling history the Iranian Revolution and the rise of religious nationalism still reverberating around the globe today.

The Forgotten 500: The Untold Story of the Men Who Risked All for the Greatest Rescue Mission of World War II (Gregory A. Freeman, forward by Alex Kershaw, Dutton Caliber, New York, NY, 352 pp., Nov. 4, 2025 $32 HC) The daring rescue of hundreds of U.S. airmen shot down over Nazi-occupied Yugoslavia after bombing Romanian oil fields.

Sword Beach: D-Day Baptism by Fire (Max Hastings, W. W. Norton & Co., New York, NY, 400 pp., Nov. 11, 2025 $31.99 HC) Follows in stark detail a handful of British soldiers landing at Normandy on one of the most fateful days of the 20th century.

Facing Washington’s Crossing: The Hessians and the Battle of Trenton (Steven Bier, Westholme Publishing, Yardley, PA, 356 pp., 20 illustrations, Sept. 2025 $35 HC) From newly translated documents, a fresh perspective on the Hessians at the Battle of Trenton.

Kennedy’s Coup: How America Descended into Vietnam (Jack Cheevers, Simon & Schuster, New York, NY, 704 pp., Feb. 17, 2026 $35 HC) A decade of research went into this account of the secret role of Kennedy’s White House in encouraging the 1962 assassination of South Vietnam president Ngo Dinh Diem.

Sweet Victory: How the Berlin Airlift Divided East and West (Joseph Pearson, Pegasus Books/dist. Simon & Schuster, New York, NY, 288pp., Dec. 2, 2025 $29.95 HC) A fresh look at the largest air op in history—277,500 flights, 2.3 million tons of essentials—during the Cold War.

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