From my bookshelf: The Winds of War

The Winds of War by Herman Wouk
My rating: 5 out of 5 stars

I will point out that this book is massive, but it crams so many really great things into one book... a family saga, politics, Italy, Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt, New York, German occupation... the list goes on and on.  But the common denominator between all of these is the family that it all centers around - The Henry family.

• Victor (also known as "Pug") is the father.  His is in the Navy and sent on special assignment as a naval attache to Germany right before the outbreak of the war.
• Rhoda is married to Pug and accompanies him to Germany for his assignment.  She is everything that a wife of a naval attache should be - charming, engaging, smart - plus a lot of opinions of her own.
• Warren is the oldest son and is also in the Navy, stationed at Pearl Harbor.  He is the type of son that excels at everything and makes his family proud.
• Byron (also known as "Briny") is the other son.  He is more of a free spirit and is hanging out in Italy with a Jewish girl named Natalie Jastrow and her grandfather.
• Madeline is the only daughter in the Henry family.  She is an obedient, well-behaved daughter... until she moves out to go to New York to work on a radio program.

There are many other important characters that show in this book to create a series of side stories that are personal to each member of the family.  Of course, all of these stories are happening against the backdrop of the months of tension right before WWII broke out.  I think this book paints a very realistic picture of what it must have been like right before Hitler decided to change the world.

While it took me a little bit to get into this book, I really really liked it.  I genuinely cared about what is going to happen to the characters as chaos breaks out.  And I also really like that this book is historically accurate and does present German opinions in a very matter of fact.  I actually felt like I learned a lot about WWII that I did not know before picking up this book.

This book does have a follow-up book called War and Rememberance. I will definitely be reading that one.