Some Good Reading

Tim Cook, curator of the Canadian War Museum and author of "Nowhere to Run" and "Cilo's Warriors" has written an excellent volume of books (with the new one, "Shock Troops: Canadians Fighting the Great War 1917-1918) coming out on September 30th. Volume 1, "At the Sharp End" tells the history of the start of the First World War, the formation of the First Contingent and the first battles (Ypres to Mt. Sorrel) the Canadian Expeditionary Force faced.

I got to tell you this is an amazing piece of work and one of the few books I stayed up all night reading, simply because I could not put it down. From the inception of the First Contingent (on a shoe string budget) to the first action at 2nd Ypres to Mt. Sorrel, from the description Tim Cook puts forward you will feel like you are there on the Western Front.

The book, however, isn't all battles. The book also describes the boring day to day routine of the average soldier's life at the front. Fun and games and the British perspective of the Canadians are also talked about in great detail. From this first volume you begin to see how the First World War transformed Canada from British dominion into a distinctive country with its own identity.