| The White Rose of Stalingrad - the real-life adventure of Lidiya Vladimirovna Litvyak, the highest scoring female air ace of all time
(2013)
|
| Front Cover |
Book Details |
|
| Genre |
Non-Fiction |
| Subject |
Stalingrad, Battle of, Volgograd, Russia, 1942-1943; World War, 1939-1945 - Campaigns - Eastern Front |
| Publication Date |
2013 |
| Format |
Hardcover (9.4
mm)
|
| Publisher |
Osprey |
| Extras |
Dust Jacket; Dust Jacket Cover |
|
| Personal Details |
| Store |
Barnes & Noble |
| Purchase Price |
$14.36 |
| Acquire Date |
4/1/2013 |
| Condition |
As New |
| Rating |
0 |
|
| Product Details |
| Dewey |
940.54 |
| ISBN |
9781849088107 |
| Edition |
[1st ed.] |
| Cover Price |
$27.95 |
| No. of Pages |
319 |
| First Edition |
Yes |
| Rare |
No |
|
| Notes/Review |
If I could rate this book 3.5 stars, I would.
The story of Lidiya Litvyak is a difficult one to tell. She was not a public figure; there's really not much documentary evidence of her life. Yenne tells her story by telling the stories of other girls of her age who lived near her in Moscow or the other women pilots. This includes some general history of the Soviet Union between the October Revolution and the war. Some other reviewers here didn't like this technique but I think it worked quite well. We can't know what she said or thought because there's very little record of it, but we can deduce what she must have experienced based on events and conditions that were common with other people.
The book has an index and bibliography but no source notes. From this, I deduce there was no original research done. But there are many sources referenced in the text that don't appear in the bibliography, so my deduction may be incorrect. Many places in the text Yenne reconciles conflicting accounts - this magazine article says she had x victories in this time period, that article says y. It's clear he's done a fair amount of research and tells a story not often told. Having read the book, I see I could have learned about Litvyak by reading two or three of these other sources, but had I read just one, I wouldn't have gotten as accurate a picture as Yenne compiles. |
|