Rating: 
Summary: Griffin is wonderful, as usual, in The Corps series
Review: *Semper Fi* is the first novel in The Corps series by W.E.B. Griffin. It's been in my to-be-read pile for years, but I only recently picked it up. I am a huge fan of the Brotherhood of War series also so I knew I wouldn't have any trouble enjoying these as well.*Semper Fi* covers the span of about a year (1941) traveling the globe from Shanghai, China to Quantico, Virginia and focusing on a couple of good Marines, "Killer" Kenneth J. McCoy and Pick Pickering. McCoy enlisted in the Marines a few years prior to the beginning of the novel and is on his way up the ranks, fluent in multiple languages and a talent for intelligence. Pickering is the wealthy grandson of the Foster hotels owner and is just beginning his career after graduating from Harvard. The backdrop is pre-American involvement in World War II. The 4th Marines are still stationed in China hoping to maintain positive interactions with both the Japanese and Chinese armies and the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor is still months away. After a few 'incidents', McCoy is shipped off to the Philadelphia Navy yard where his military career will soon skyrocket. Griffin is an extremely talented writer. Even though you'd think that these novels are for the military gung-ho fans, Griffin does a great job of including suspense, romance and even comedy in his novels. This series is definitely worth your time and money!
Rating:
Summary: Griffin is wonderful, as usual, in The Corps series
Review: *Semper Fi* is the first novel in The Corps series by W.E.B. Griffin. It's been in my to-be-read pile for years, but I only recently picked it up. I am a huge fan of the Brotherhood of War series also so I knew I wouldn't have any trouble enjoying these as well. *Semper Fi* covers the span of about a year (1941) traveling the globe from Shanghai, China to Quantico, Virginia and focusing on a couple of good Marines, "Killer" Kenneth J. McCoy and Pick Pickering. McCoy enlisted in the Marines a few years prior to the beginning of the novel and is on his way up the ranks, fluent in multiple languages and a talent for intelligence. Pickering is the wealthy grandson of the Foster hotels owner and is just beginning his career after graduating from Harvard. The backdrop is pre-American involvement in World War II. The 4th Marines are still stationed in China hoping to maintain positive interactions with both the Japanese and Chinese armies and the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor is still months away. After a few 'incidents', McCoy is shipped off to the Philadelphia Navy yard where his military career will soon skyrocket. Griffin is an extremely talented writer. Even though you'd think that these novels are for the military gung-ho fans, Griffin does a great job of including suspense, romance and even comedy in his novels. This series is definitely worth your time and money!
Rating: 
Summary: A Waste of Time
Review: I picked up these books hoping to gain some insight into the actions of the Marine Corps in the Pacific during World War II. What I found instead was a sort of soap opera that rambles on for hundreds of pages without getting around to much actual fighting. For example, The Marines don't even land on Guadalcanal (their first major offensive) until the end of book IV, some 1700 pages into the story. Those 1700 intervening pages are mostly conversations (ad nauseam) between stateside Marine Corps officers as they sit around headquarters, or go out on the town chasing skirts. The small portion of the books that is devoted to actual battles is done in such a cursory fashion that you're left with the impression that the author either finds this aspect of the Marines' mission distasteful, or doesn't understand it well enough to write about it. Mr. Griffin could have deleted about 80% of his material, and would have ended up with better books, albeit still not good ones. If you're the sort of person who likes to watch daytime soap operas, then you may enjoy these books. If, on the other hand, you're interested in military history, the banality of these books will have you pulling out your hair in frustration.
Rating: 
Summary: ZZZZzzzz boring zzzzZZZZ
Review: A good old-fashioned military-fiction story, Semper Fi is the first in a series spanning 7 books about the Marine Corps before, during and after WWII. Set in pre-war China, Griffin will start character development for one of the main protagonists, Kenneth "Killer" McCoy. After reading that name, you're probably thinking, "God, that sounds cheesy." You're right. This is a cheesy book. It's all cheese into book three, too. It was so cheeseball that I didn't read the fourth. It was mildly entertaining though. This is a TV book with nothing more valuable than mindless entertainment. The characters are shallow, the plot is predictable and the writing style comes straight out of a rejected John Wayne script. What made me set this series down for good was that the storyline was too perfect. Enlisted men became officers, everyone falls in love, the blind can see again (really), heroic acts of bravery, 100% sucessful covert operations, etc. This is all fun but after the first 1,000 pages of constant accomplishment, the reader gets a bit bored with the story. If you don't read much and want a book to glance at every now and then, this is a good series to pick up. The more experienced reader will need better plot development to pay attention, which this book does not have. Although, if you're a Marine, especially an enlisted Marine, you will probably LOVE this series because everything perfect happens to the enlisted characters... rating: 2 starts (for the series)
Rating:
Summary: Don't start this one unless you have all 7 books
Review: A powerhouse of action, suspense, friendship, and even love. You can almost smell what Griffin is writting. Also read the Men at War series while you are waiting for book 8 or 9 or whatever he is on now. Believe me 8 or 9 or 10 or 50 books of this calibur are not enough. By the time you are through you will feel like you personally know Pick, Ken, Erine Page,Zimmerman, Banning, and all of the others. So buy them all not just Semper Fi we need to keep W.E.B. Griffin in pencils and paper.
Rating:
Summary: An Addictive Series
Review: After reading this, the first book in "The Corps" series, I the purchased the rest three at a time. Since finishing the series, I have now read every book Griffin has published. Griffin's character development is so thorough that you feel you have gotten to know a real people as the various series develop. The Corp Series offers a great "behind the scenes" look at WWII in the Pacific Theatre, what it meant to the men that served and stirs the patriotic juices inside of you. One of many fantastic books from a terrific author.
Rating:
Summary: Didn't know this should have an NC-17 rating
Review: After reading this, the first book in "The Corps" series, I the purchased the rest three at a time. Since finishing the series, I have now read every book Griffin has published. Griffin's character development is so thorough that you feel you have gotten to know a real people as the various series develop. The Corp Series offers a great "behind the scenes" look at WWII in the Pacific Theatre, what it meant to the men that served and stirs the patriotic juices inside of you. One of many fantastic books from a terrific author.
Rating:
Summary: An Addictive Series
Review: After reading this, the first book in "The Corps" series, I the purchased the rest three at a time. Since finishing the series, I have now read every book Griffin has published. Griffin's character development is so thorough that you feel you have gotten to know a real people as the various series develop. The Corp Series offers a great "behind the scenes" look at WWII in the Pacific Theatre, what it meant to the men that served and stirs the patriotic juices inside of you. One of many fantastic books from a terrific author.
Rating:
Summary: Great Novel and Great Series
Review: First off, this book is a novel and the genre is drama, not war. It is not about war but about the culture and relationships, history and traditions of men who fight wars. The story of course is set against a war, but it could be any modern war in any theatre. What you are getting is a perspective on what goes on in mens minds when they make decisions about their fates or how to get a box of bullets onto an island in the middle of no where.
The reader meets the various characters as they meet one another and sees and thinks what they do from their various perspectives. They tell their own stories, ambitions and worries so you know whats going on in their minds. At times, the reader gets to walk in the shoes of the young private thrust into new situations, then the reader is in the head of a more experienced soldier who meets private. Everything in the military tradition informs an officer that his word is gold and a private's is meaningless and then the private exhibits characteristics that makes the officer contemplate his original presumption. If he acts on the private's words, whill his own judgement be questioned? If he's wrong, will his career or life be over? Those thoughts go through people's minds at every level of decision making. There are the career elisted men, the younger and older officers, the career trouble makers and cilivians who have put on uniforms, there are men whose sons are fighting beside them or wives who worry about them both. There are men who advance quickly and men who the war exposes as being out of their league. They all have historical reasons to mistrust one another but they must work together because there is simply no one else.
Generally, the men must form quick impressions of their comrades. Then the impressions change or deepen. Men of oddly different backgrounds form deep friendships or intense animosities. Men find one another personally challenging, useful, an obstacle or whatever. The reason this is all important is because their lives and the future of the country hangs on every decision they make and this is what makes for such interesting and compelling reading.
There are countless tomes about battles and campaigns but very little exploration, especailly at the lower ranks, of why one man puts his life in another mans trust and almost no writing the explores all the back channels and double dealing that goes on in the military culture.
While this novel is unlikely to fill in your knowledge of any particular battle, it may inform your understanding of every other historical book you read by letting you get into the heads of men at every level of the fighting.
This series is fairly condensed compaired to the Brotherhood of Arms series. It covers from around 1940 to 45 with some extra books taking the characters into the Korean War. The BoAs series introduces you to another great cast of characters but the time range takes you from 1942/3 til 1970 and visits them more often than not when the country is not at war. Also, check out the Honor Series, which takes you to South America during the war. Awesome stuff.
Rating:
Summary: As a Marine....
Review: For those who want a lesson in history, for those who were never in the Corps, for those who were in the Corps, you have to read this book. I've been approached by other Marines who have read it and hands down, the best entertaining history lesson you'll have, all eight of them. I'm waiting for the next one....
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