World War II The Definitive Visual Guide (DK Definitive Visual Histories)

Anyone with a fascination or a in interest in ww2 or someone that it studying this, then this visual guide is a must. It shows everything from the lead up to ww2 right through to the demizise of Hitler and everything else through to the wars in Japan.

This book contains information on almost every area of the War, from its origins to its ends. This is definitely the most definitive single volume book I have read and well worth the price. It contains superb images, text, diagrams and specs on many vehicles, weapons, location and even people. This is in no way a complete book, but then again no book could possibly hope to cover the vast topics of the war in a single volume, it would take dozens of books if not more to go into every detail. What this book does provide is the backbone of the war, providing key information without going into excessive detail. The book itself is a large hardback book presented in a way that would allow even children to follow it as it is not page after page of text but more like an encyclopaedia with beautiful colour images on every page to accompany the topic.

Very informative!

Excellent book. Superb photos & information time-lined. Very impressed.

This book takes a very complex subject and makes it very accessible. The layout is solid with a great selection of images to go with the text. The maps as well are very good with just the right level of detail to give a picture of what is going on but not so much detail that you will feel overwhelmed. They are also enriched by use of color and the use of texture. If I am nitpicking the one thing I would say is the captions could have been made a bit easier to read and the movement arrows a bit more pointy and also there are a couple of campaigns in the latter half of the book with no map where a map would have been helpful but on the whole the maps are well made and well used. From what I see most of the information in the book seems to be accurate though I felt there is weak spot regarding certain details on the Eastern Front. For example the fact of Italy joining the german campaign against The Soviet Union is not mentioned at all save that about a hundred pages later there is a brief mention of some of their units being crushed on the Stalingrad front. Romania and Hungary do get a mention of sorts though the Hungarian entry date is wrong. It is mentioned that Finland joined the war but only as a footnote in a much earlier section and the reason given for it is debatable. Another point is that The Romanian surrender to the Soviets in 1944 is noted though not the fact of Romania also declaring war on Germany or the fact that the Romanian armed forces then fought beside the Soviets as they drove toward places like Budapest and Vienna. Also the book states at one point that The Balkans were liberated with the re-capture of Belgrade in 1944 when in actual fact the fighting in Yugoslavia continued another year right up until the armistice. Generally though these are omissions of information rather than outright errors and for the most part the amount of information packed into the book is actually quite impressive. The missing details for the Eastern Front is the one reason I gave 4 stars instead of 5 but in terms of the material on other campaigns I can't really find much fault.

Great

Great book for the history buff in your life. Makes a great present

Firstly I need to point out I've only recently received the book so have read just 30 pages of around 350 in total, but I just had to give a review at this early stage as this book is truly exquisite. I've always been fascinated by WWII with it's countless different aspects, in particular Hitler and how he came to be this infamous character that was obviously evil but also extremely charismatic. The first book I bought on this subject was the 'For Dummies' one which in itself was very informative and well written but, at least for me, lacked the real punch of the big colour photographs and diagrams of this book that really bring the text to life. Another thing that I didn't expect was the sheer quality of the book itself, solid hardback with a glossy cover coupled with the large size give it a really professional look and optimises room for content. Finally I feel the need to respond to some negative claims about this book not being the truly 'definitive guide', well if those people care to look at the front cover it's there in print and clear for all to see - 'The Definitive VISUAL Guide' But to sum up, if you have any interest in this subject and are deciding which book to go for out of the countless numbers, this it IT.