Rating: 
Summary: The Unforgettable story of The men of Easy Company
Review: Band of Brothers is a true to life story about the training and war experiences that Easy Company of the 506th regiment, 101st airborne lived through during the Second World War. The men of Easy Company were like every other company put together, all men who came from either a small town or major city. Yet when they begin the hard training the men endure physical testing that they have never experienced in their lives. Yet the men grow and build up together and begin to create bonds unlike any others. Due to the great amount of pressure they are being put through and the most difficult training the army has to offer because of the brand new Airborne infantry which Easy company along with the rest of the 101st airborne and other divisions who were forging the new concept of airborne infantry. The reason why this book is incredibly well written and worth reading is because the author Stephen Ambrose interviews all of the men who served in easy company from its formation, what they had gone through and what were their personal accounts of that certain day or battle that they took part in. This book takes WWII to a whole different level when you think of the sacrifices that were made to ensure victory. The men of easy company distinguished themselves as being one of the best rifle companies in the entire world and had contributed more than any other company, and endured more than any other company who had seen combat in the War. The author writes the book in such a way to describe what went on in a fashion that paints a picture that you can imagine in your mind. You can just picture what the men of easy company had gone through while being dropped out of a plane under the cover of darkness from the skis over Normandy before the seaborne invasion, to being huddled in a foxhole that they dug while being encircled by the relentless German enemy while in Bastogne with no reinforcements. The book gives a profound feeling that at that time in Easy company's existence, hope was not a feeling of a safe return home away from all war, but that hope represents that you would not let yourself down, and you would not let your comrades down and thinking about getting home later. The very stories of this book will describe to you an unforgettable story about the citizen soldiers who stepped up and became the best fighting force in the entire army.
Easy company was by far one of the most distinguished and recognized companies throughout the entire war, for this book are the story of the men who fought and died for each other. There story will live on forever in the minds of the people who served in easy company and survived all of the war, death, and pure hell of being in combat in Europe during WWII.
-Ryan Mancini
Rating: 
Summary: Small Unit History
Review: Ambrose does a great job of conveying the experience of a single company of the 101st Airborne, from its organization and training in North Carolina all the way through Normanday and to the end of the war. Along the way Ambrose teaches several lessons about training and operating an airborne unit on a squad, platoon and company level. Some of these guys were simply studs, some were lucky and many, many were unlucky and wound up dead or maimed. This small unit focus allows the reader to truly care for the individual soldier, but Ambrose manages to do this without sentimentality or over-dramatizing. But, similar to Ambrose's other oral history books (D-Day, Citizen Soldiers, Pegasus Bridge), these stories are often told with a lack of larger context or meaning. That was the experience of the individual paratroopers that this book is about. They sweat on the training field and bled on the battle field, and they fought primary for themselves. There is no psychoanalyzing the bond between these brothers in arms, but Ambrose shows us how real it it is. Perhaps the ultimate lesson of this book is that wars are won by the courage and determination of small units like Easy Company. For answering the call the duty, we owe them a debt, but they will never call it in. They fought for each other.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful piece of history
Review: Band of Brothers follows an elite group of soldiers in World War II. Did I say "an" elite group? I may be understating them a bit; from this book, they appear to be one of the greatest collection of soldiers to ever face combat, a group a young men who excelled in all endeavors and played a major part in winning the Second World War.Once you understand how much material is covered in this book, you will be amazed it is told in a mere 300 pages. While much is gained from this thrifty narrative (it is really hard to put down), it does becoming confusing for those of us who aren't familiar with the content. I have a hard time with some of the military terminology (I don't know which is higher, 1st or 2nd lieutenant). Ambrose doesn't slow down to explain these things either. He zips right on to the next training mission or engagement. This isn't a book about the military in general. Rather, it is a tightly focused account of one group's experience in WWII, from training to their post-war lives. Easy Company is also a very large group, making it nearly impossible to keep all the names straight. Ambrose doesn't want to focus on a few people, because greatness was found in the actions of many. Therefore, it at times becomes difficult to recall who exactly is at the center of the story playing out. The men all seem to become a conglomerate, one nameless, faceless soldier who does everything. Those may be two problems I have with the novel, but don't read this as a negative review at all. This is a powerful and important book. I am in awe of the brave, young men who signed up for Easy Company, knowing they would have the hardest training and most difficult assignments in the war. To a man, the boys answered they wanted this challenge so they could trust the man beside them in battle. The only way to know you are surrounded by the best is to become the best yourself, and these boys did that. I am humbled by reading their exploits and feel blessed to share a country and a flag with these men. I only fear I will be haunted by these tales, as I realize it will be hard to do as much with my life as these men did with theirs; they did indeed set the bar high for the rest of us.
Rating:
Summary: "From Normandy To Hitler's Eagle Nest..."
Review: Band of Brothers(1992). A Non-Fiction novel by Stephen E. Ambrose.
In World War II, as Hitler and The Third Reich rose up against Europe, America's brave young soldiers were deployed into an event the world will never forget. In the Army, many fine soldiers gave their lives to defend our freedom, and, to this day, no battalion was as decorated and remembered as well as the 101st Airborne Division. As good as any rifle company in the world, Easy Company, part of the 101st Airborne Division, was responsible for parachuting into Normandy on D-Day, freezing in the Battle of the Bulge, and liberating Hitler's Eagle Nest at Berchtesgaden. Although they suffered causalities of over 125%, Easy Company remained intact, a band of brothers until the end. With all the heroics and legendary tales about Easy Company, it's no surprise that Stephen E. Ambrose, author of D-Day and Citizen Soldiers, recounted the history of Easy Company. Drawing from hours of research and interviews, Ambrose recounted the stories of these American heroes, and his effort turned into a New York Times Bestseller and a very successful HBO miniseries. So, was the book your typical history novel, or a breathtaking history of Easy Company? Read on to find out...
Plot-
The United States is at war, and to preserve our freedom, they must fight for liberty and peace with the nation's finest, the elite soldiers who do what they must to protect our country. No matter where you came from, may it be the North, South, Midwest, or California, World War II soldiers shared a common bond with each other, a sense of comradeship that lasted through life until death. For Easy Company, 101st Airborne, the dreadful Camp Toccoa brought them together. There, the company faced the harshest tasks, from running 25-miles to doing a thousand push-ups, and the soldiers felt the same aches and scars together. After months of intense physical workouts and numerous parachuting exercises, General Patton is ready to deploy Easy Company for their first mission. As part of an elaborate plan (D-Day), Easy Company is ordered to take out the numerous gun batteries around Normandy to provide cover for the infantry coming from Omaha Beach. In that day, Easy Company showed valor and courage beyond imagination: with just about 50 men, Easy Company inflicted casualties four times that. After that, Easy Company was shipped off to Holland to help with Operation MARKET-GARDEN, and fight in the subzero temperatures of the Battle of the Bulge. Easy Company was also the first army regiment to take Berchtesgaden, a nazi stronghold. Throughout their adventures, Easy Company became world-renowned, taking place in the most important battles of World War II, and receiving massive attention. To this day, Easy Company's adventures are still being researched today, and their legacy will live on forever.
Writing/Opinions-
I don't like non-fiction, much less historical non-fiction. Even though, I've always been fascinated by war and its aftermath, and I was a big fan of the TV miniseries 'Band of Brothers', so I decided to pick this novel for a project. Fortunately, I didn't write this novel off, because, this is by far the best book about World War II I've ever read, and it kept me interested on every page. Stephen E. Ambrose extensively and thoroughly researched Easy Company, compiling hours and hours of interviews from survivors and studying journals, so this novel could catch every little thing, and the results are breathtakingly surreal. I wondered many times where Ambrose could have gotten some of his facts, but they're all documented. Ambrose lays the battle scenes out with perfect precision, never missing a beat, keeping the reader enthralled on the field of battle, and even when Easy Company's taking a break from war! Ambrose is a magnificent historian, and it shows in his work!
Overall, 'Band of Brothers' is an excellent novel on World War II and Easy Company, and the books fast-pace and realism kept me interested all the way through. Every scene was intense and passionate, and Ambrose never fails to miss even the most unimportant information. If a biography could get more specific, I'd like to see it! Ambrose excels in writing and research, and that really shows in his non-fiction, which reads like any fiction novel.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED TO FANS OF WORLD WAR II, HISTORY, THE 101ST AIRBORNE, OR STEPHEN AMBROSE. HISTORY NOVELS DON'T GET ANY BETTER THAN THIS! IF YOU LIKED THE MOVIE, CHECK THIS OUT!
Also Recommended-
Band of Brothers- DVD
D-Day- Stephen E. Ambrose
Undaunted Courage- Stephen E. Ambrose
Thanks for reading!
Rating: 
Summary: B.O.B. is fair quality, but not fair in its outlook on WW2
Review: First of all, I was very entertained by the Band of Brothers miniseries on HBO a couple of years ago, and my interest in that show encouraged me to buy the book upon which it is based.
While I enjoyed this book (I especially enjoyed reading about what the men of Easy Company did after the war, though I felt this section of the book was far too skimpy and brief) I also felt that it did a bit of disservice to other fighting units for the sake of praising Easy Company.
I especially took offense to Ambrose's quote of an Easy Company soldier (Major Winters himself) referring to USAAF men as "air force slobs." I will concede and praise Easy company for their heroics, however to refer to air force crew as "slobs" is utterly insulting. Ambrose wrote "Wile Blue," about B-24 bomber units, so he himself should have known of the absolutely catastrophic death rate for air force crew even into 1945, when the 3rd Reich was on its last legs. He needs only to take one look at the list of bomber crew who successfully completed the 24 mission (later lengthened to even more missions) tour of duty to see how relatively few managed to do it before getting blasted to pieces by flak, having 30mm cannon shells from Fw190s crashing into their bodies, or the depressing horror (before late 1944) of watching fighter escort turn for home and leaving the bombers alone to the enemy fighters for the rest of the trip. The frosbite suffered by easy company on one campaign was a constant companion for all air crew. Ask any former B-17 pilot what it was like to come home with dead crew, wounded crew, many of whom were just high school boys, and it is clear how close the crew of any bomber became in combat.
I also felt is was unfair of Ambrose to praise the 506th easy company regiment at the expense of other divisions of the airborne (17th and 82nd) and even at the expense of other units of the 101st. Naturally men from any unit will think highly of themselves (and deservedly so), and this IS a book only about E company, however Ambrose sort of gives the impression (I know he didn't mean to, but that's how he came off to me) that the American army was just so-so and the men of easy company were better than them all. Really? I think the men of the 82nd might have something to say about that. Or the ranger battallions. Or men of the Coldstream Guards. Or the men of Liebstandarte Adolf Hitler and Das Reich at Kharkov 1943, or Colonel Student's paratroopers at Crete 1941. Or men of the 3rd Army. Or the men of the Eight Air Force. If it weren't for the air force crippling the Luftwaffe I highly doubt Easy Company could have succeeded as they did. German fighters would have eaten the Normandy drop for dinner, and strafed everything in sight. That they did not is a tribute to the "air force slobs."
Rating:
Summary: Good Topic, Boring Writing
Review: I read this book as part of my outside reading requirement in AP U.S. History. The teacher had this book in his classroom bookshelf so I borrowed it to read. I enjoyed the story but I thought it didn't develop the different scenarios to make it exciting. Since it is history, and since the situations are probably inherently exciting without embellishment, the author probably didn't feel the need to dramatize the action. But for me (who doesn't know much about WW2), I didn't understand a lot of what was going on because Ambrose doesn't explain what different things are. A glossary would be nice. Also I didn't really like the way Ambrose just seemed to talk to the soldier named Webster who kept saying how he never volunteered for extra work. Ambrose seems to use Webster as an authority on how things happened. Just because he went to Harvard doesn't make him the sensitive intellectual that Ambrose likes to paint him as. Other than that, good book, but could have used more group pictures or at least more generic pictures to show how parachuters look when they fall from planes. All the quoting of Webster just makes the whole thing less heroic. MAybe they did just do what they had to do, but if that's the case Webster shouldn't be the one judging who is a hero and who is not one.
Rating:
Summary: Be Proud, Be Grateful to these Men
Review: I've read several very good books on WWII, each of them contain a certain amount of blood and guts, the bloodier the better I guess. This book is different, yes it does have blood and guts and violence but that is the side story. The real story is about the men of Easy Company, especially Major Winters. All of the officers had unique characteristics, Nixon, Speirs and even Sobel. The NCO's and enlisted men truly lived as as "Band of Brothers". The part where Speirs confronts the man who just shot Sgt. Grant is especially a powerful read. As an American I felt very proud that these men sought to free Germany from a maniac (we still have despot maniac's today around the world). The book and the miniseries are awesome. Read the story of the men of Easy Company, you will feel proud.
Rating:
Summary: Give a copy to a high school student!
Review: If you enjoyed the HBO miniseries, you need to purchase and read the book BAND OF BROTHERS. It is my personal favorite of Stephen Ambrose's works -- more personal and intimate than D-DAY: THE SIXTH OF JUNE and more physical, energetic, and gripping than CITIZEN SOLDIERS. Two things make this book unique in war literature: 1) the emphasis on pre-combat training and the development of a unit's esprit de corps; and, 2) the attention paid to the postwar lives of the men who served. As always, Ambrose's machine gun prose seizes your imagination with perfect historical details. Another historian might tell you that training was tough, only Ambrose knows that American paratroopers were more fit than the professional football players and prize fighters of their day (and that the athletes often served as physical training instructors for the troopers!). Another historian might tell you that the company commander survived the war and led a prosperous, peaceful life; only Ambrose lets you know that the same man raises geese but would never think of slaughtering them for food. Stephen Ambrose made a unique contribution to the profession of history and to the United States of America because he was able, more than any other researcher, to elicit from the heroes of World War II the complete and candid accounts of their actions. If you already have read BAND OF BROTHERS, I suggest than you turn next to Ambrose's PEGASUS BRIDGE, which recounts the daring and critical glider raid by British commandos the night before D-Day. Another, little known book that any reader of BAND OF BROTHERS will treasure is WITH THE OLD BREED: ON PELELIU AND OKINAWA by Eugene Sledge. Sledge served with the Marines in the Pacific and endured some of the worst combat in the history of the world. He survived to write a compelling and unforgettable memoir.
Rating:
Summary: One correction
Review: R.A. Forzyk's 1-star review has at least one glaring error itself.
"It gets worse. Ambrose asserts that Winters "is contemptuous of exaggeration," but the following account of E Company in Normandy flatly exposes this as a lie: "So was Winters [outstanding]. He made one right decision after another ...he personally killed more Germans and took more risks than anyone else." So Winters killed more Germans than the company machine-gunners? He took more risks than the men on point? Interestingly, Winters was never wounded."
That passage was in reference to the battle at the crossroads in Belgium, not Normandy.
Rating:
Summary: A First-rate Work on Combat Infantry in World War II
Review: Stephen Ambrose has written a gripping account of an airborne infantry company in World War II -- from its origins in a Georgia training camp, through its combat operations in Western Europe, to its eventual capture of Berchtesgaden, Hitler's retreat in Bavaria, at the close of the war. Ambrose comments tellingly on the roots of personal courage and unit cohesion in the face of violent conflict, cold, hunger and the possibility of imminent death. On a broader scale, he shows how the grand-scale strategies of General Eisenhower and other commanders become implemented in the specific tactics of Easy Company and other allied units in the field. I particularly liked the small maps provided for the interested reader to trace the tactical movements of Easy company, and also the photographs of its personnel. The televised series based on Ambrose's work was interesting, but it could not give us the texture and breadth that the book provides so well. This is a book that I will re-read in the future and I highly recommend it.
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