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“[A] ripping account…In some respects, the focus on the carnage is salutary, as a reminder of war’s true human cost. But it is as well to remember too that there were acts of kindness and heroism alongside the folly and murder…It is instructive to read of unimaginable slaughter; it is equally instructive to read of efforts to transcend it.”
— New York Times Book Review
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“Beevor has demonstrated, through his previous book on Stalingrad, D-day, and the fall of Berlin, that he understands precisely how to balance meticulous research with captivating prose…One senses, nevertheless, that those earlier books were just building blocks to this, his magnum opus.”
— Washington Post
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“Rich in anecdotal detail…Beevor’s book gives us the opportunity to comprehend the greatest, most dire event of the twentieth century—and tells us more about human nature than we may wish to know.”
— Washington Times
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“A page-turner…Hypocrisy and self-sacrifice, corruption and idealism, sadism and compassion, genocide and cannibalism: Beevor brilliantly shows, at all levels, that WWII defies easy generalization.”
— Publishers Weekly (starred review)
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“Whether a battle or an atrocity, Beevor illustrates it with one person’s experience, preventing stupefaction over his data on the millions of dead…As a summarizing introduction to WWII, Beevor’s is a fine example of the form.”
— Booklist
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“A deeply enlightening experience. A work of vast research, depth, and insight.”
— Kirkus Reviews
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His account of atrocities on both sides, of errors committed and of surpassing bravery makes for excellent -- though often blood-soaked -- reading. Beevor gets better with each book.
— Kirkus Reviews
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This is a superb book and a model of the historian's craft. It stands as the best one-volume history of this decisive military engagement.
— Christian Science Monitor
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The first impression on seeing D-Day on the bookshelf might be a question, "Why yet another book on D-Day?" The answer comes through in the detailed research and exhaustive treatment of individual stories as the Allies lodged ashore and then advanced on that fateful day and after, all the way to Paris...For anyone with any interest at all in World War II in Europe, especially the time from the landings through the liberation of Paris, D-Day is the book for you.
— Vice-Admiral Robert F. Dunn , Washington Times
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One of Beevor's strengths is his ability to describe the day-to-day experience of ordinary soldiers: the food, the weather, the smells, the humor, the fear. . . Perhaps this is what makes Beevor's D-Day such terrific reading. It details the shattering reality of D-Day and the months of savage fighting that followed instead of offering empty mythologizing. This is that rare hardcover worth your valuable attention and money.
— USA Today
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Glorious, horrifying...D-Day is a vibrant work of history that honors the sacrifice of tens of thousands of men and women.
— Time