Book Database
Every book linked to the real events it covers, with sourcing assessments and reading difficulty ratings.
Berlin Diary
William Shirer · 1941 · 605pp
Guadalcanal Diary
Richard Tregaskis · 1943 · 263pp
Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo
Ted Lawson · 1943 · 221pp
Here Is Your War
Ernie Pyle · 1943 · 304pp
A Bell for Adano
John Hersey · 1944 · 269pp
Brave Men
Ernie Pyle · 1944 · 474pp
Up Front
Bill Mauldin · 1945 · 228pp
Man's Search for Meaning
Viktor Frankl · 1946 · 184pp
The Pianist
Władysław Szpilman · 1946 · 222pp
Hiroshima
John Hersey · 1946 · 152pp
The Diary of a Young Girl
Anne Frank · 1947 · 283pp
If This Is a Man
Primo Levi · 1947 · 188pp
The Last Days of Hitler
Hugh Trevor-Roper · 1947 · 288pp
Tales of the South Pacific
James A. Michener · 1947 · 384pp
Company Commander
Charles B. MacDonald · 1947 · 278pp
War As I Knew It
George S. Patton · 1947 · 425pp
The Naked and the Dead
Norman Mailer · 1948 · 721pp
The Second World War
Winston S. Churchill · 1948 · 4448pp
Crusade in Europe
Dwight D. Eisenhower · 1948 · 559pp
The Young Lions
Irwin Shaw · 1948 · 689pp
The Great Escape
Paul Brickhill · 1950 · 264pp
From Here to Eternity
James Jones · 1951 · 861pp
The Cruel Sea
Nicholas Monsarrat · 1951 · 416pp
The Caine Mutiny
Herman Wouk · 1951 · 537pp
The Dam Busters
Paul Brickhill · 1951 · 288pp
The Bridge on the River Kwai
Pierre Boulle · 1952 · 224pp
Stalingrad
Vasily Grossman · 1952 · 1088pp
Panzer Leader
Heinz Guderian · 1952 · 554pp
Requiem for Battleship Yamato
Yoshida Mitsuru · 1952 · 152pp
The Rommel Papers
Erwin Rommel · 1953 · 545pp
HMS Ulysses
Alistair MacLean · 1955 · 320pp
The Good Shepherd
C.S. Forester · 1955 · 256pp
Hiroshima Diary
Michihiko Hachiya · 1955 · 238pp
Midway: The Battle That Doomed Japan
Mitsuo Fuchida & Masatake Okumiya · 1955 · 266pp
Defeat Into Victory
Field Marshal William Slim · 1956 · 576pp
Cross of Iron
Willi Heinrich · 1956 · 444pp
Helmet for My Pillow
Robert Leckie · 1957 · 320pp
Day of Infamy
Walter Lord · 1957 · 243pp
The Guns of Navarone
Alistair MacLean · 1957 · 320pp
The Longest Day
Cornelius Ryan · 1959 · 350pp
A Woman in Berlin
Anonymous · 1959 · 261pp
Night
Elie Wiesel · 1960 · 120pp
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
William Shirer · 1960 · 1249pp
Life and Fate
Vasily Grossman · 1960 · 871pp
Catch-22
Joseph Heller · 1961 · 453pp
Mila 18
Leon Uris · 1961 · 539pp
The Thin Red Line
James Jones · 1962 · 510pp
King Rat
James Clavell · 1962 · 479pp
Strong Men Armed
Robert Leckie · 1962 · 563pp
Eichmann in Jerusalem
Hannah Arendt · 1963 · 312pp
Russia at War, 1941-1945
Alexander Werth · 1964 · 1136pp
The Forgotten Soldier
Guy Sajer · 1965 · 465pp
Is Paris Burning?
Larry Collins & Dominique Lapierre · 1965 · 378pp
The Last Battle
Cornelius Ryan · 1966 · 571pp
Incredible Victory
Walter Lord · 1967 · 331pp
The Fall of Japan
William Craig · 1967 · 368pp
Slaughterhouse-Five
Kurt Vonnegut · 1969 · 275pp
Inside the Third Reich
Albert Speer · 1969 · 596pp
The 900 Days
Harrison Salisbury · 1969 · 635pp
Iron Coffins
Herbert Werner · 1969 · 329pp
The Winds of War
Herman Wouk · 1971 · 885pp
The Hiding Place
Corrie ten Boom · 1971 · 241pp
When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit
Judith Kerr · 1971 · 191pp
Das Boot
Lothar-Günther Buchheim · 1973 · 560pp
Enemy at the Gates
William Craig · 1973 · 457pp
A Bridge Too Far
Cornelius Ryan · 1974 · 670pp
Into That Darkness
Gitta Sereny · 1974 · 380pp
The Face of Battle
John Keegan · 1976 · 354pp
War and Remembrance
Herman Wouk · 1978 · 1042pp
Naples '44
Norman Lewis · 1978 · 206pp
Sophie's Choice
William Styron · 1979 · 562pp
Bomber Command
Max Hastings · 1979 · 484pp
Goodbye, Darkness
William Manchester · 1980 · 401pp
With the Old Breed
Eugene Sledge · 1981 · 326pp
At Dawn We Slept
Gordon Prange · 1981 · 873pp
Goodnight Mister Tom
Michelle Magorian · 1981 · 318pp
The Miracle of Dunkirk
Walter Lord · 1982 · 323pp
Schindler's List
Thomas Keneally · 1982 · 400pp
Six Armies in Normandy
John Keegan · 1982 · 365pp
Alan Turing: The Enigma
Andrew Hodges · 1983 · 736pp
Overlord: D-Day and the Battle for Normandy
Max Hastings · 1984 · 368pp
Empire of the Sun
J.G. Ballard · 1984 · 351pp
The Unwomanly Face of War
Svetlana Alexievich · 1985 · 384pp
Eagle Against the Sun
Ronald Spector · 1985 · 589pp
Pegasus Bridge
Stephen Ambrose · 1985 · 198pp
A Time for Trumpets
Charles B. MacDonald · 1985 · 712pp
The Drowned and the Saved
Primo Levi · 1986 · 203pp
The Making of the Atomic Bomb
Richard Rhodes · 1986 · 886pp
If You Survive
George Wilson · 1987 · 288pp
The Second World War
John Keegan · 1989 · 608pp
Number the Stars
Lois Lowry · 1989 · 137pp
Maus
Art Spiegelman · 1991 · 296pp
Band of Brothers
Stephen Ambrose · 1992 · 333pp
Quartered Safe Out Here
George MacDonald Fraser · 1992 · 225pp
Ordinary Men
Christopher Browning · 1992 · 271pp
The English Patient
Michael Ondaatje · 1992 · 305pp
Soldat
Siegfried Knappe · 1992 · 384pp
D-Day: June 6, 1944
Stephen Ambrose · 1994 · 656pp
A World at Arms
Gerhard Weinberg · 1994 · 1178pp
No Ordinary Time
Doris Kearns Goodwin · 1994 · 759pp
Captain Corelli's Mandolin
Louis de Bernières · 1994 · 437pp
Why the Allies Won
Richard Overy · 1995 · 396pp
The Reader
Bernhard Schlink · 1995 · 218pp
When Titans Clashed
David Glantz & Jonathan House · 1995 · 414pp
Citizen Soldiers
Stephen Ambrose · 1997 · 512pp
The Rape of Nanking
Iris Chang · 1997 · 290pp
Stalingrad
Antony Beevor · 1998 · 493pp
Between Silk and Cyanide
Leo Marks · 1998 · 614pp
The Battle of Kursk
David Glantz & Jonathan House · 1999 · 472pp
Embracing Defeat
John W. Dower · 1999 · 676pp
We Band of Angels
Elizabeth Norman · 1999 · 327pp
Flags of Our Fathers
James Bradley · 2000 · 376pp
The Bronze Horseman
Paullina Simons · 2000 · 637pp
Ghost Soldiers
Hampton Sides · 2001 · 342pp
In Harm's Way
Doug Stanton · 2001 · 339pp
Atonement
Ian McEwan · 2001 · 351pp
The Wild Blue
Stephen Ambrose · 2001 · 299pp
The Siege
Helen Dunmore · 2001 · 294pp
The Fall of Berlin 1945
Antony Beevor · 2002 · 490pp
An Army at Dawn
Rick Atkinson · 2002 · 681pp
First Light
Geoffrey Wellum · 2002 · 338pp
Blood Red Snow
Günter Koschorrek · 2002 · 320pp
Flyboys
James Bradley · 2003 · 398pp
The Bedford Boys
Alex Kershaw · 2003 · 274pp
Monte Cassino
Matthew Parker · 2003 · 416pp
Armageddon: The Battle for Germany, 1944-1945
Max Hastings · 2004 · 616pp
The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors
James Hornfischer · 2004 · 480pp
The Longest Winter
Alex Kershaw · 2004 · 289pp
Shattered Sword
Jonathan Parshall & Anthony Tully · 2005 · 613pp
The Book Thief
Markus Zusak · 2005 · 552pp
A Writer at War
Vasily Grossman · 2005 · 378pp
Ivan's War
Catherine Merridale · 2006 · 462pp
Masters of the Air
Donald L. Miller · 2006 · 671pp
The Wages of Destruction
Adam Tooze · 2006 · 800pp
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
John Boyne · 2006 · 216pp
Ship of Ghosts
James Hornfischer · 2006 · 530pp
Beyond Band of Brothers
Major Dick Winters · 2006 · 292pp
The Kindly Ones
Jonathan Littell · 2006 · 992pp
Retribution: The Battle for Japan, 1944-45
Max Hastings · 2007 · 615pp
The Day of Battle
Rick Atkinson · 2007 · 791pp
The Zookeeper's Wife
Diane Ackerman · 2007 · 368pp
Sarah's Key
Tatiana de Rosnay · 2007 · 294pp
Agent Zigzag
Ben Macintyre · 2007 · 364pp
The Third Reich at War
Richard J. Evans · 2008 · 926pp
Hitler
Ian Kershaw · 2008 · 1072pp
City of Thieves
David Benioff · 2008 · 258pp
D-Day: The Battle for Normandy
Antony Beevor · 2009 · 591pp
The Storm of War
Andrew Roberts · 2009 · 712pp
Tears in the Darkness
Michael & Elizabeth Norman · 2009 · 463pp
Unbroken
Laura Hillenbrand · 2010 · 473pp
Bloodlands
Timothy Snyder · 2010 · 524pp
Operation Mincemeat
Ben Macintyre · 2010 · 400pp
The Pacific
Hugh Ambrose · 2010 · 449pp
Citizens of London
Lynne Olson · 2010 · 471pp
The Forgotten Highlander
Alistair Urquhart · 2010 · 320pp
HHhH
Laurent Binet · 2010 · 327pp
Inferno: The World at War, 1939-1945
Max Hastings · 2011 · 729pp
Pacific Crucible
Ian Toll · 2011 · 597pp
Neptune's Inferno
James Hornfischer · 2011 · 528pp
Lost in Shangri-La
Mitchell Zuckoff · 2011 · 384pp
The Liberator
Alex Kershaw · 2012 · 432pp
The Last Lion: Defender of the Realm
William Manchester · 2012 · 1182pp
A Higher Call
Adam Makos · 2012 · 392pp
Savage Continent
Keith Lowe · 2012 · 480pp
Double Cross
Ben Macintyre · 2012 · 416pp
Code Name Verity
Elizabeth Wein · 2012 · 339pp
The Guns at Last Light
Rick Atkinson · 2013 · 877pp
Forgotten Ally
Rana Mitter · 2013 · 458pp
The Girls of Atomic City
Denise Kiernan · 2013 · 373pp
Life After Life
Kate Atkinson · 2013 · 529pp
All the Light We Cannot See
Anthony Doerr · 2014 · 531pp
When Books Went to War
Molly Guptill Manning · 2014 · 267pp
D-Day Through German Eyes
Holger Eckhertz · 2015 · 218pp
The Conquering Tide
Ian Toll · 2015 · 668pp
The Nightingale
Kristin Hannah · 2015 · 440pp
Symphony for the City of the Dead
M.T. Anderson · 2015 · 456pp
KL: A History of the Nazi Concentration Camps
Nikolaus Wachsmann · 2015 · 865pp
The War That Saved My Life
Kimberly Brubaker Bradley · 2015 · 316pp
The Fleet at Flood Tide
James Hornfischer · 2016 · 638pp
Lilac Girls
Martha Hall Kelly · 2016 · 487pp
SAS: Rogue Heroes
Ben Macintyre · 2016 · 380pp
Salt to the Sea
Ruta Sepetys · 2016 · 391pp
We Were the Lucky Ones
Georgia Hunter · 2017 · 416pp
The Choice
Edith Eger · 2017 · 320pp
Beneath a Scarlet Sky
Mark Sullivan · 2017 · 524pp
Code Girls
Liza Mundy · 2017 · 416pp
The Librarian of Auschwitz
Antonio Iturbe · 2017 · 423pp
The Tattooist of Auschwitz
Heather Morris · 2018 · 288pp
D-Day Girls
Sarah Rose · 2019 · 384pp
A Woman of No Importance
Sonia Purnell · 2019 · 368pp
The Volunteer
Jack Fairweather · 2019 · 505pp
The Huntress
Kate Quinn · 2019 · 560pp
Twilight of the Gods
Ian Toll · 2020 · 944pp
The Splendid and the Vile
Erik Larson · 2020 · 585pp
The Book of Lost Names
Kristin Harmel · 2020 · 388pp
The Rose Code
Kate Quinn · 2021 · 656pp
The Diamond Eye
Kate Quinn · 2022 · 435pp