The World War II Chronicles: The Fall of Japan and Enemy at the Gates

William J. Craig

2017. g. jūn. · Open Road Media

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A “virtually faultless” account of the final weeks of World War II in the Pacific and the definitive history of the battle for Stalingrad together in one volume (The New York Times Book Review).

Author William Craig traveled to three different continents, reviewed thousands of documents, and interviewed hundreds of survivors to write these New York Times–bestselling histories, bringing the Eastern Front and the Pacific Theater of World War II to vivid life.
 
The Fall of Japan masterfully recounts the dramatic events that brought an end to the Pacific War and forced a once-mighty nation to surrender unconditionally. From the ferocious fighting on Okinawa to the all-but-impossible mission to drop the second atom bomb, and from Franklin D. Roosevelt’s White House to the Tokyo bunker where tearful Japanese leaders first told the emperor the war was lost, Craig draws on Japanese and American perspectives to capture the pivotal events of these climactic weeks with spellbinding authority.
 
Enemy at the Gates chronicles the bloodiest battle of the war and the beginning of the end for the Third Reich. On August 5, 1942, giant pillars of dust rose over the Russian steppe, marking the advance of Hitler’s 6th Army. The Germans were supremely confident; in three years, they had not suffered a single defeat. The siege of Stalingrad lasted five months, one week, and three days. Nearly two million men and women died, and the 6th Army was completely destroyed. The Soviet victory foreshadowed Nazi Germany’s downfall and the rise of a communist superpower. Heralded by Cornelius Ryan, author of The Longest Day, as “the best single work on the epic battle of Stalingrad,” Enemy at the Gates was the inspiration for the 2001 film of the same name, starring Joseph Fiennes and Jude Law.
 

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William Craig (1929–1997) was an American historian and novelist. Born and raised in Concord, Massachusetts, he interrupted his career as an advertising salesman to appear on the quiz show Tic-Tac-Dough in 1958. With his $42,000 in winnings—a record-breaking amount at the time—Craig enrolled at Columbia University and earned both an undergraduate and a master’s degree in history. He published his first book, The Fall of Japan, in 1967. A narrative history of the final weeks of World War II in the Pacific, it reached the top ten on the New York Times bestseller list and was deemed “virtually flawless” by the New York Times Book Review. In order to write Enemy at the Gates (1973), a documentary account of the Battle of Stalingrad, Craig travelled to three continents and interviewed hundreds of military and civilian survivors. A New York Times bestseller, the book inspired a film of the same name starring Jude Law and Joseph Fiennes. In addition to his histories of World War II, Craig wrote two acclaimed espionage thrillers: The Tashkent Crisis (1971) and The Strasbourg Legacy (1975).