Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge discussion

Use this space to discuss books you're reading or that might fit the fourteenth Read Harder task.

Some posts which might help:

https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/8...

http://bookriot.com/2014/07/07/48-exc...

http://bookriot.com/2016/08/01/100-mu...

http://bookriot.com/2016/11/11/canadi...

http://bookriot.com/2014/11/17/genre-...

I was thinking On Hallowed Ground: The Story of Arlington National Cemetery,

Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk,

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption or

Twelve Years a Slave

Some on my list:

All the Light We Cannot See
When Books Went to War: The Stories that Helped Us Win World War II
Citizen 13660
No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II
Dark Invasion 1915: Germany's Secret War & the Hunt for the First Terrorist Cell in America

I started reading An Interrupted Life by Etty Hillesum (the 'adult Anne Frank') and stopped half way through. that'd qualify for this,right?

Book Riot wrote: "Use this space to discuss books you're reading or that might fit the fourteenth Read Harder task." There are so may great possibilities for #14. Catch 22 is a classic. Unbroken and The Things They Carried also great. More recent find is Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier.

Now I have the perfect excuse to finally read 1776 which has been languishing on my shelf for a very long time.

Rilla of Ingleside is the sixth (?) book in the Anne of Green Gables series, and is a really good depiction of what life was like at home in Canada during WWI.

I want to read 'All the Light We Cannot See' by Anthony Doerr. I wanted to read it for a long time now. This year is going to be the year. ;)

I guess I'm having a hard time with the phrase "about war." My first thought was to finish reading Thank You for Your Service, but while it's about soldiers, it's about their struggles returning to civilian life and not about war itself.

Am I over-thinking this?

The Things They Carried and Going After Cacciato would both be good for this. I also recommend Dispatches.

I think I might go with Retire the Colors: Veterans & Civilians On Iraq & Afghanistan, which is an anthology of essays.

I haven't picked one yet, but I definitely recommend Blackout by Connie Willis and Code Name: Verity by Elizabeth Wein.

Stina wrote: "I guess I'm having a hard time with the phrase "about war." My first thought was to finish reading Thank You for Your Service, but while it's about soldiers, it's about their strugg..."

No, I think this is an excellent choice. It's about the psychology of war and is a pertinent topic right now. I think I'll add this to my list of possible books to read for this category.

I am thinking The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers. It is also a debut novel.

Martha wrote: "Stina wrote: "I guess I'm having a hard time with the phrase "about war." My first thought was to finish reading Thank You for Your Service, but while it's about soldiers, it's abou..."

Thanks, that's a good way of looking at it.

Selena wrote: "I haven't picked one yet, but I definitely recommend Blackout by Connie Willis and Code Name: Verity by Elizabeth Wein."

Blackout is awesome! I would strongly recommend having All Clear ready to go, though. My understanding is that Willis's publisher insisted on chopping the story into two books. It shows.

I picked up All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque this year but haven't read it yet, so I'm going to use it for this prompt. It's about WWI. It was also published in 1928 so could be used for the 'published between 1900 and 1950' prompt, and it was one of the books banned & burned by the Nazi's, it could fit for the 'banned or challenged in your country' prompt for German participants. (German title Im Westen nichts Neues - according to Wikipedia. Sorry, I don't speak German so I can't translate myself.)

Melissa wrote: "Do you think The Zookeeper's Wife qualifies for this task?"

Yes, and if you are doing another challenge that wants you to read a book and then see a movie, the movie of this book comes out next year.

Melissa wrote: "Martha wrote: "Melissa wrote: "Do you think The Zookeeper's Wife qualifies for this task?"

Yes, and if you are doing another challenge that wants you to read a book and then see a m..."

I really enjoyed that book and the movie trailers look good.

Stina wrote: "I guess I'm having a hard time with the phrase "about war." My first thought was to finish reading Thank You for Your Service, but while it's about soldiers, it's about their strugg..."

If you like this book, think about Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging. It's really thought provoking, and it's one of my favorites of 2016. I really enjoyed the audiobook, too. Read by the author.

I'm thinking Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy: Four Women Undercover in the Civil War - if you've read it, do you think it fits? Or does it focus to much on the women and less so on the war?

Going to choose between Operation Mincemeat: How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory or Countdown to Pearl Harbor: The Twelve Days to the Attack for this task.

I'm going to read Agnès Humbert's Resistance: A Frenchwoman's Journal of the War. Somehow that feels relevant.

Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon, if you want to really go all in.

Probably will read A Town Like Alice

Oh yeah! I read it last year, but Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War would be an awesome pick for this. Mary Roach is funny and you could probably read it pretty quick.

I was already planning to read The Diary of Anne Frank in advance of my trip to Amsterdam, so I think I will use that one for this task.

I would like to suggest "Here Bullet," a collection of poems written during the war in Iraq, by Brian Turner. The book doesn't take long to read, but you won't forget it anytime soon.

I highly recommend The Nightingale for this category.

A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra
The Things they Carried by Tim O'Brian

Doing Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West which I've heard is a very difficult read because it's sad. This is a good excuse to educate myself, however, about a darker part of my country's past.

My bookclub recently read Girl at War by Sara Novic - it would be a great choice for this challenge (also a first novel)

I have been considering Vimy by Pierre Berton for this one, as it has been on my shelf for some time. A couple of the novels in this thread have been on my tbr for awhile though.

Would Rapture by Kameron Hurley count for this? I read the first two books in this series towards the end of 2016, and have been meaning to read it anyway.

I highly recommend Citizen 13660 by Miné Okubo. It's a graphic (as in pictures, not gore) memoir by a Japanese-American woman who was interned in Utah with her family during WWII. It's a quick read, but I learned a lot about our history that I hadn't learned in school.

I'm thinking of reading Tolkien and the Great War: The Threshold of Middle-earth for this one.

This one will either be Red Platoon: A True Story of American Valor or Redeployment.

One that will work is Team of Teams: The Power of Small Groups in a Fragmented World. It is by a US General about how the army need reorganization during the War on Terror.

"Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam" is a very powerful and moving book.

If you're looking for an idea, the Kindle version of Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo is on sale for $2.99 today. And you can add audible narration for $3.49.

Sarah wrote: "Oh yeah! I read it last year, but Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War would be an awesome pick for this. Mary Roach is funny and you could probably read it pretty quick."

This is looking like my pick for the task - glad to hear you enjoyed it!

Terri wrote: "I highly recommend Citizen 13660 by Miné Okubo. It's a graphic (as in pictures, not gore) memoir by a Japanese-American woman who was interned in Utah with her family during WWII. It's a quick read..."
Thanks for the suggestions.

I just recently bought a book about Stanislaw Petrow and I plan to read this book for this task.

I just finished reading The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

Sarah wrote: "Oh yeah! I read it last year, but Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War would be an awesome pick for this. Mary Roach is funny and you could probably read it pretty quick."

I haven't read any of Mary Roach yet and I've been really wanting to, so I will read this for the category.

Im either going with Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War or War.

I think Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, about the civil war in Nigeria in the 1960s, would be good for this category

I'll probably read War's Unwomanly Face about women fighters in Russia's WWII Army, Lilac Girls, or When Books Went To War. I've wanted to read Bomb Girls for years, but none of my libraries have it.

I recommend Max Brooks' graphic history The Harlem Hellfighters about African Americans in World War I.
I also recommend Elizabeth Wein's novels about women who were fliers in World War II, Rose Under Fire, Code Name Verity and Black Dove, White Raven, which is about one of the wars pre- World War II.
I also recommend the more relatively recently set Redeployment by Phil Klay, which is about veterans & combatants in Iraq & Afghanistan.

I'm going to read The War That Saved My Life by Kimberly Brubaker Bradly