November 1942: An Intimate History of the Turning Point of World War II Hardcover – Deckle Edge, November 21, 2023

Peter Englund intelligently weaves together a diverse collection of personal narratives at the turning point (November, 1942) of World War Two. It is a well written sequential narrative (of November) and the selection of people is sometimes surprising and always informative about the details of many lives (British, American, Germans, Russians, Italians, Finns, Dutch, French, Australians, Canadians, Koreans, Chinese, Japanese, and others--a wide variety of people from all walks of life as well as combatants)--what World War Two felt like.

The format for this book was intriguing to me. Taking the month of November 1942, which is thought to be a key turning point in WWII, and cycle through the experiences of multiple people, combatants and civilians. In many cases the author highlights combatants on both sides of a given conflict. Each highlight is 2-3 pages or less. The result is very fast paced and I was immediately drawn in and felt invested in all the people and their stories. Much more than I expected to be. The book was hard to put down.

Using a large number of diary entries and personal look backs at a pivotal month in the progress of WWII, historian Peter Englund posits that the Allies achieved a turnaround on virtually all major fronts against the Axis powers. Three salient areas--North Africa, Stalingrad and Guadalcanal get particular attention though the author includes observations from civilian home fronts on both sides of the war. The one significant omission in the latter area is the domestic scene in Japan in the time period which may have something to do with translation issues that were less a challenge when researching European and American sources.Not surprisingly, the greatest emotional impact on this reader came from the accounts of the brutal fighting during the winter at Stalingrad and the treacherous jungle battles and day-to-day struggle to survive the privations of Guadalcanal. In all three of the major battle areas, the strategic and tactical decisions by upper military levels on both sides seem hugely flawed and driven political egotism or general ignorance and incompetence.This is an impressive work by Englund--a major contribution to the history of period, but also a compelling collection of eye-witness thoughts and experiences that grab and hold the reader's attention throughout.

I want to thank the author for tackling such a deep and difficult time that was the 1940s. This book also brilliantly contrasts the lives torn apart by war and those living in unaffected places. It made me appreciate that this horrible war had a huge impact on everyone. The photographs added valuable context and the footnotes were as informative as the main text. This was not a quick read by any means —among the hopeful small stories, glimmers of hope, there also were upsetting in parts. Im not familiar with this author, this was the first of his works that he has written. Thank you again and for providing a glimpse into my parents’ and family members experienced.

Sydney M. WilliamsNovember 1942, Peter EnglundJanuary 10, 2024“I see those men with maps and talkWho tell how to go and where and why;I hear with my ears the words of their mouths,As they finger with ease the marks on the maps.”Experience, 1904Carl Sandburg (1878-1967)As Carl Sandburg wrote, battles are fought far from those who direct them. As Mr. Englund explains in his “Note to the Reader,” this book does not describe what war was during the four weeks in November 1942, but tries “to say something about how it was.”It was the month of November 1942 that saw Germany stymied at Stalingrad, the American invasion of North Africa and the German-Italian defeat at El Alamein; it witnessed the Guadalcanal campaign that ended Japanese expansion in the South Atlantic and the Japanese retreat in New Guinea. At the start of November, it appeared that the Axis might be victorious. By the end of the month, it seemed certain that the Allies, ultimately, would be victors. It was on November 10, following Montgomery’s victory over Rommel at El Alamein that Churchill spoke at the Lord Mayor’s Luncheon in London: “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” While he was right, of the estimated 60 to 80 million people who died in World War II most were yet to meet their fate.It is through letters, diaries and memoirs of thirty-nine individuals, and from newspaper accounts, that the Swedish historian and journalist Peter Englund reconstructs the month. With the exception of authors Vera Brittain, Albert Camus, and Ernst Junger, these are ordinary people, innocently caught up in the most devastating war mankind has ever known. We read the letters of a Russian soldier in Stalingrad and the thoughts of an Italian soldier in the North African desert, and those of a Japanese lieutenant on Guadalcanal; we read of an Australian infantry sergeant in New Guinea, the letters and diaries of a Long Island housewife with a son overseas, and the memoirs of an American woman who worked with Enrico Fermi in Chicago on spontaneous nuclear chain reaction. We read the diaries of a young Jewish woman in Paris (who was later imprisoned and beaten to death in Bergen-Belson five days before the camp was liberated in 1945,) the memoirs of an Australian doctor held prisoner on Java, the writings of a German woman journalist in Berlin, the memories of an American sailor in the North Atlantic, the diaries of a teen-age girl, a German-Jewish refuge in Shanghai, the diary of a Korean “comfort woman” in Japanese-occupied Burma, and the letters of a young German woman who will be guillotined in three months for sabotaging the Third Reich.We also read of Casablanca, which premiered that month and whose ending was changed to reflect the American landings in North Africa. In a brief epilogue, Mr. Englund tells us what happened to the thirty-nine people whose lives during that month comprise his story.Toward the end of his book, Mr. Englund writes: “How we experience a war is influenced by pictures and mental images acquired in peace, and that often leads to battles playing up to their own myth…” But war is never pins on a map. It is ugly, fought by the brave and the scared, as Peter Englund so vividly describes.