Excellent world war two audio history

Air Classics, May 2001

Told in the words of the combat veterans

Patrick O'Donnell's Beyond Valor was an excellent book that told the combat history of the war in Europe in the words Ranger and Airborne veterans themselves, and perhaps the most honest and brutal account of combat ever told. That book is now available in four audio cassettes (six hours) and is read by Ron McLarty and a full cast that puts all the drama of the book into the spoken word. For more than 50 years the individual stories that make up this narrative - shockingly frank reflections of sacrifice and courage - have been buried or circulated privately. Now, nearing the ends of their lives, our WWII soldiers have last unburdened themselves.

This audio recording recaptures their hidden history, the history of the average GI. Patrick O'Donnell is a pioneering oral historian who used his award-winning web site, the Drop Zone (www.thedropzone.org), to solicit oral and e-histories from individual soldiers. Gradually, as a community, some of the war's most battle-harderred soldiers were persuaded to tell their stories.

It is the story of the war not discussed in polite company. O'Donnell presents the wreckage of entire battalions nearly annihilated, invisible personal scars, and haunting revelations of wartime atrocities. But more important are the men who recount lives risked without hesitation for comrades and cause, and those who did not return: The friends who died in their arms. From BDD Audio at $25.95.