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  • The Force

  • The Legendary Special Ops Unit and WWII's Mission Impossible
  • Written by: Saul David
  • Narrated by: Matthew Waterson
  • Length: 9 hrs and 42 mins
  • 4.4 out of 5 stars (15 ratings)

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The Force

Written by: Saul David
Narrated by: Matthew Waterson
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Publisher's Summary

Hailed as "masterly" (Wall Street Journal) and a "monumental achievement" (Douglas Brinkley), this book tells the riveting, true story of the group of elite US and Canadian soldiers who sacrificed everything to accomplish a crucial but nearly impossible WWII mission.

In December of 1943, as Nazi forces sprawled around the world and the future of civilization hung in the balance, a group of highly trained US and Canadian soldiers from humble backgrounds was asked to do the impossible: capture a crucial Nazi stronghold perched atop stunningly steep cliffs. The men were a rough-and-ready group, assembled from towns nested in North America's most unforgiving terrain, where many of them had struggled through the Great Depression relying on canny survival skills and the fearlessness of youth. Brought together by the promise to take part in the military's most elite missions, they formed a unique brotherhood tested first by the crucible of state-of-the-art training—including skiing, rock climbing, and parachuting—and then tragically by the vicious fighting they would face.

The early battle in the Italian theatre for the strategic fort cost the heroic US-Canadian commando unit—their first special forces unit ever assembled—enormous casualties. Yet the victory put them in position to continue their drive into Italy, setting the stage for the Allies' resurgence toward victory in WWII. The unit, with its vast range of capabilities and mission-specific exercises, became a model for the "Green Berets" and other special forces groups that would go on to accomplish America's most challenging undertakings behind enemy lines.

Knitting first-hand accounts seamlessly into the narrative-drawing on interviews with surviving members and their families; the memoirs, letters, and diaries of Forcemen; and declassified documents in the American, Canadian, British, and German archives—The Force tells a story that is as deeply personal as it is inspiring.

©2019 Saul David (P)2019 Hachette Audio
  • Unabridged Audiobook
  • Categories: History
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What the critics say

"A very fine book...Saul David has both a knack with the pen and a nose for a thrilling tale....Masterly [in] style...Readers should exult in The Force, whose heroic subjects deserve to be forever remembered."—Alexander Rose, Wall Street Journal

"The Force brilliantly recounts the heroic exploits of the first U.S. and Canadian Special Operations team, tasked with decommissioning a supposedly impregnable Nazi stronghold. Every chapter is filled with harrowing adventure, life and death struggle, and bedrock patriotism. The amount of new cutting-edge research is impressive. A monumental achievement!"—Douglas Brinkley, #1 New York Times bestselling author of American Moonshot: John F. Kennedy and the Great Space Race

"A riveting and harrowing account...An important, highly engaging work that is, as novelist Raymond Chandler once wrote of a book he was reviewing, unputdownable."—Washington Independent, Books of the Month

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not a great second half

The book started out great but seemed to be rushed once it seemed to reach it's height of excitement. so much more could've been added. Instead the facts and stories were skimmed over in the last 2 chapters.

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