Item Detail

Arendt, a retired advertising executive, offers a personal narrative of life as a platoon leader in the 29th Infantry Division in the European Theater of World War II (1944-45). The 29th landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day, liberated St. Lô, and carried admirably on to the Rhine. Many such narratives have been written since the 50th anniversary of the war. This is not one of the more memorable ones. A good writer, Arendt describes well the early hedgerow battles in Normandy and offers interesting tidbits about military life as a noncombat officer. Overall, though, the work is superficial and lacking in insight. For a deeper, more revealing look at how war can change people, see Roscoe Blunt's Inside the Battle of the Bulge (Praeger, 1994) and Stephen Ambrose's excellent Citizen Soldiers (LJ 11/15/97). Recommended only for more extensive World War II collections. Richard S. Nowicki, Emerson Vocational H.S., Buffalo, NY Copyright 1998 Library Journal Reviews