D-Day: June 6, 1944: The Climactic Battle of World War II (Library Binding)

The book begins through about 100 pages of introductory material which includes a synopsis of the political/war climate, some brief information about the respective commanders, an overview of the planning process, and other miscellany.

This material is quite helpful in setting the background, though Ambrose asserts various things about democracy, totalitarianism, Britain, Nazi High Command, and Nazi strategy which seem questionable in truth (and in some cases, out of context). For example, Ambrose asserts in various ways and in various places that a democracy produces a better soldier than a dictatorship. Whether it is true or not, Ambrose was entirely incapable of proving either in a logical and objective way. He also challenged the commonly held notion that the German Army (in the entire spectrum of WW2) was not as effective as it is commonly believed to have been, despite having a kill ratio of 2 to 1 (his own words). This, too, was an assertion that he wasn't able to argue either way, as he dedicated only a couple sentences in this "persuasion," for what probably could fill an entire book. Unfortunately, this type of thing seems to be a recurring theme whenever Ambrose integrates his opinion.

Overall, he sometimes tries to analyze things and ends up doing a poor job as the assertions are weakly, if it all, supported by argument, and I sometimes got the feeling that he was inappropriately overstepping his bounds in terms of context (surely some of the things he brought to the table deserve a much more exhaustive treatment than he was willing to give).

However, These analyses are few and far between, and the subsequent 400 pages are very interesting and captivating, but that is solely due to the material itself. With laugh-out-loud sentences like, "That someone was spelled i-n-f-a-n-t-r-y," I sometimes thought that if it wasn't for the good testimony, I would surely put this book down in a second. Such is to be expected, I suppose, with the history factory that Ambrose was. He was known put many, many books out in a short amount of time, and one can only expect that they wouldn't be up to the caliber of, say, Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, especially since Ambrose doesn't have a gift for prose.

There is also the issue, as other reviewers have mentioned, of whether Ambrose was being too US-centric in his treatment of the history, but that is beyond my knowledge. While this book does give the impression that it was written for US audiences only (bad move for a historian, in my opinion), I didn't get the feeling that the Brits and Canadians were "cheated" in anyway.

So, if you're looking for an easy read that that concentrates mainly on the first person perspective of a soldier in the Normandy invasion and touches mildly on troop movement and strategy, then this is the book for you. Don't be too swayed by all my negativity, because despite all its shortcomings, it's still an interesting read. I, however, plan to supplement this book with one that concentrates mainly on strategy and troop movement.