Nobody takes readers to war better than New York Times bestselling historical-fiction novelist Jeff Shaara. His sweeping, epic tales of world-altering events have long been the special favorites of military veterans and those on active duty, as well as of non-military readers who just want compelling dramas that made history by playing out on real-life stages.
"These are the stories as the characters themselves might have told them," Shaara has said of his books. "The characters are real people or (composites) of real people. I'm not looking to make myths or embellish bogus history, but to make discoveries. And there are a lot of them."
Shaara's latest title is The Bee Book Club's choice for June. "The Final Storm" is the fourth and final entry in his World War II series, and moves from the closing conflict in Europe to the "fierce maelstrom" of the Pacific theater. There, "the Americans mount a furious assault on the last great steppingstone to Japan itself – the heavily fortified island of Okinawa." The three-month-long battle is seen "through the eyes of combatants on both sides," including the Japanese general charged with defending Okinawa.
Meanwhile, while war is waged across the Pacific, a team of scientists in the United States races to refine "a weapon so powerful (no one knows) the consequences of what they are about to unleash." As President Harry S. Truman and his advisors weigh their options, the Japanese people await "the day of reckoning that everyone knows is coming."
Through 11 novels, Shaara has dramatized events in the Revolutionary War, the Mexican-American War of 1847, the Civil War, World War I and World War II.
"I try to tell you the history without boring you with the history," he has said. "I do not write the stuff you read in high school that every student hates."
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