Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose
Review by: Candi

The book was fascinating from beginning to end, and I loved how it was told from the perspective of half a dozen men in Easy Company as opposed to a strictly factual account - that would have made for some dry reading. However, I don't find Stephen Ambrose to be a very talented writer (at least not in this book!). If he had been writing about anything else that wasn't as compelling, I probably would have had a hard time finishing the book. I recently saw him on Letterman, and he is a fabulous storyteller - in person. I found the most intriguing parts of the book (apart from letters sent home from soldiers and commentary from those still living) was the quoted sources from a book called Rendezvous with Destiny: A History of the 101st Airborne Division by Leonard Rapport and Arthur Northwood, Jr. Unfortunately, I am having trouble locating this book on Amazon; I would love to read it.

There is a particularly scathing review on Amazon by Dr. Robert A. Forczyk, who states Ambrose favors oral accounts over historical accuracy, and "the book is hopelessly riddled with errors, exaggerations and vicious slander." The slander he is referring to was supposedly made by Dick Winters and the rest of the unit, for being brutally honest about Captain Sobel, the tyrant who trained the men at Toccoa. Perhaps Dr. Forczyk believes that a man with rank automatically deserves respect, but considering Sobel couldn't even read a map, and would have led his men to certain death had he not been demoted before the troops left for their first jump, my opinion is that their opinions were more than justified. Perhaps Dr. Forczyk also missed the title of the book, "Band of Brothers", thereby suggesting that the book was told from the perspective of those men and those men only. I would be more inclined to take the word of soldiers who actually served in the war than that of an anal-retentive reviewer on Amazon who seems to fancy himself a historian, because we all know that every historical account of WWII that has been published is free of any and all errors. *rolling eyes*

At any rate, I still loved the book. Having seen only two parts of the HBO mini-series, I am now dying to see the rest, but will have to wait until they put it out on DVD. I will go out on a limb and say that I think the mini-series will be far more interesting than the book, but I'm happy that I read and own this book, anyway.

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