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Archives for March, 2013
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Games of Thrones by George Martin – Book Review
A bit like the curate's egg really. However the good parts don't excuse the bad in my opinion. What I liked about it was the fact that it was a good political/dynastic story and that we saw things from many different character points of view. This is sufficiently unusual in the fantasy (and in fact in most fiction) genre that it should really get a lot of praise, and I think that might be what made it so popular. However I didn't like the blatantly misogynist viewpoints of some of the characters (at first I thought it was the whole tone of the story, but I realised on persevering with it that it was simply a majority of the male characters). While I can see that this is probably a realistic viewpoint for the characters in that setting, I didn't…
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Allies at Dieppe – 4 Commando and the US Rangers by Will Fowler
This is an excellent history of a small unit action set in the wider context of the war, and well explained for those not steeped in military history or the second world war. IWM caption : THE DIEPPE RAID, 19 AUGUST 1942 Lt Col The Lord Lovat, CO of No. 4 Commando, at Newhaven after returning from the raid. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) The author starts with setting the background, explaining the grand sweep of the war and the events that lead to the formation of the commandos in mid-1940 and then a high-level overview of the commando training and the early operations so that you understand what commandos are all about, and the strategic context that lead to the assault on Dieppe in late summer 1942. The build up to the attack is well covered, based heavily on the account…