The Greatest War Stories Never Told

100 tales from military history to astonish, bewilder, & stupefy

written by Rick Beyer

Harper Collins, 2005

Genre: Children's/YA nonfiction

Reading Level: ages 12-15

224 pages

The Greatest War Stories Never Told is a very interesting book for all the history buffs out there. It is a collection of war stories that you may or may not have heard of. From the story behind The Star Spangled Banner to secret stories of the Spartans, and many more. My personal favorite was in 1859 when the U.S. and Great Britain were at odds about the San Juan Island Chain and who it belonged to. At one point a man named Lyman Cutlar, and American living on San Juan Island shot a pig that was squatting in his yard. It turned out to be a British pig, oops. The British authorities threatened to arrest Lyman if he didn't pay for the loss. He refused and the Americans on the island requested help from the U.S. army. The governor of British Columbia did his part and sent a warship to the island. Both sides were very upset, and were on the brink of war when finally General Scott, the commander of the US army came and calmed things down bringing an end to a military argument in which there was only 1 casualty, the pig.

I would recommend this book to any older child that enjoys history and especially war stories. I suggest an older age because it is about war though my brother loved it when he was nine.

I'm sure there are several controversies that could come from reading this book. I'm sure some people will question the truth of these stories. However the author wrote that he didn't write any stories down that couldn't be authenticated.

I really liked this book, it was entertaining, interesting, and because of the way it was portrayed, very enticing. I've never really liked history books but this made history, a least the history of wars, fun.

My rating 4 out of 5