Herman Wouk was an American author renowned for his sweeping historical novels and his exploration of the human psyche under duress. Drawing frequently from his own wartime experiences, his works delve into themes of morality, command, and the nature of individuals facing extreme pressure. Wouk masterfully intertwines historical events with deeply personal narratives, creating stories that are both compelling and thought-provoking. His ability to craft complex characters and capture the spirit of an era solidifies his place as a significant voice in American literature.
These two classic works capture the tide of world events even as they unfold the compelling tale of a single American family drawn into the very center of the war's maelstrom. The multimillion-copy bestsellers that capture all the drama, romance, heroism, and tragedy of the Second World War -- and that constitute Wouk's crowning achievement -- are available for the first time in trade paperback.
Twenty years after the publication of The 'Caine' Mutiny , Herman Wouk for the first time returns to World War II, with a novel even grander in scope. Conceived and executed on a monumental scale, The Winds of War is a deeply human story of the vicissitudes of two American families caught in the war's vortex, one Regular Navy, the other Jewish intellectual, and a British war correspondent and his daughter. Their intermingled fates dominate the action and produce a saga of love, ambition, loyalties and danger. Beginning with the off-stage thunder of Hitler's Germany in 1938, the action is concentrated on four pivotal battles: the siege of Warsaw, the Battle of Britain, the march on Moscow, and the attack on Pearl Harbour. Enriched by brillant evocation of the prevailing atmosphere and conditions, and fresh and lively portraits of war leaders, notably Hitler and Roosevelt, this magnificent novel produces in the reader, through the constant participation of one or more of the main characters in events, an eye-witness's tingling consciousness of having been there——of this is how it was . And, as a reminder that war has two sides, Herman Wouk offers, by means of a perfectly syncopated commentary by a German general, a sharp, if controversial picture of the German side. All this he has achieved with a perfect sense of timing and a superb orchestration of history and fiction.
This is an alternate cover edition for 0006135749. 'City Boy' spins a hilarious and often touching tale of an urban kid's adventures and misadventures on the street, in school, in the countryside, always in pursuit of Lucille, a heartless redhead personifying all the girls who torment and fascinate pubescent lads of eleven.
The Novel that Inspired the Now-Classic Film The Caine Mutiny and the Hit Broadway Play The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial Herman Wouk's boldly dramatic, brilliantly entertaining novel of life-and mutiny-on a Navy warship in the Pacific theater was immediately embraced, upon its original publication in 1951, as one of the first serious works of American fiction to grapple with the moral complexities and the human consequences of World War II. In the intervening half century, The Caine Mutiny has become a perennial favorite of readers young and old, has sold millions of copies throughout the world, and has achieved the status of a modern classic.
Like no other novelist at work today, Herman Wouk has managed to capture the sweep of history in novels rich in character and alive with drama. In "The Hope," which opens in 1948 and culminates in the miraculous triumph of 1967's Six-Day War, Wouk plunges the reader into the story of a nation struggling for its birth and then its survival. As the tale resumes in "The Glory," Wouk portrays the young nation once again pushed to the brink of annihilation -- and sets the stage for today's ongoing struggle for peace. Taking us from the Sinai to Jerusalem, from dust-choking battles to the Entebbe raid, from Camp David to the inner lives of such historical figures as Golda Meir, Moshe Dayan, and Anwar Sadat, these extraordinary novels have the authenticity and authority of Wouk's finest fiction -- and together strike a resounding chord of hope for all humanity.
This Is My God is Herman Wouk's famous introduction to Judaism completely updated and revised with a new chapter, Israel at Forty. A miracle of brevity, it guides readers through the world's oldest practicing religion with all the power, clarity and wit of Wouk's celebrated novels.
A starry-eyed young beauty, Marjorie Morgenstern is nineteen years old when she leaves New York to accept the job of her dreams-working in a summer-stock company for Noel Airman, its talented and intensely charismatic director. Released from the social constraints of her traditional Jewish family, and thrown into the glorious, colorful world of theater, Marjorie finds herself entangled in a powerful affair with the man destined to become the greatest-and the most destructive-love of her life. Rich with humor and poignancy, Marjorie Morningstar is a classic love story, one that spans two continents and two decades in the life of its heroine. This unforgettable paean to youthful love and the bittersweet sorrow of a first heartbreak endures as one of Herman Wouk's most beloved creations.
Herman Wouk's first novel in seven years moves on from the grand themes wich have won him international acclaim, War.
It's every parrothead's dream: to leave behind the rat race of the workaday world and start life all over again amidst the cool breezes, sun-drenched colors, and rum-laced drinks of a tropical paradise. It's the story of Norman Paperman, a New York City press agent who, facing the onset of middle age, runs away to a Caribbean island to reinvent himself as a hotel keeper. (Hilarity and disaster -- of a sort peculiar to the tropics -- ensue.) It's the novel in which the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of such acclaimed and bestselling novels as The Caine Mutiny and War and Remembrance draws on his own experience (Wouk and his family lived for seven years on an island in the sun) to tell a story at once brilliantly comic and deeply moving.
Herman Wouk is one of this century's great historical novelists, whose peerless talent for capturing the human drama of landmark world events has earned him worldwide acclaim. In 'The Hope', his long-awaited return to historical fiction, he turns to one of the most thrilling stories of our time - the saga of Israel. In the grand, epic style of 'The Winds of War' and 'War and Remembrance', 'The Hope' plunges the reader into the major battles, the disasters and victories, and the fragile periods of peace from the 1948 War of Independence to the astounding triumph of the Six-Day War in 1967. And since Israelis have seen their share of comic mishaps as well as heroism, this novel offers some of Herman Wouk's most amusing scenes since the famed "strawberry business" in 'The Caine Mutiny'. First to last 'The Hope' is a tale of four Israeli army officers and the women they love: Zev Barak, Viennese-born cultured military man; Benny Luria, ace fighter pilot with religious stirrings; Sam Pasternak, sardonic and mysterious Mossad man; and an antic dashing warrior they call Kishote, Hebrew for Quixote, who arrives at Israel's first pitched battle a refugee boy on a mule and over the years rises to high rank. In the love stories of these four men, the author of 'Marjorie Morningstar' has created a gallery of three memorable Israeli women and one quirky fascinating American, daughter of a high CIA official and headmistress of a Washington girls school. With the authenticity, authority, and narrative force of Wouk's finest fiction, The Hope portrays not so much the victory of one people over another, as the gallantry of the human spirit, surviving and triumphing against crushing odds. In that sense it can be called a tale of hope for all mankind; a note that Herman Wouk has struck in all his writings, against the prevailing pessimism of our turbulent century.
