Rick -

Lawrence S. Ritter is your man. I love that book, too.

I read much more nonfiction than fiction. Back when I did read more fiction, Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men and Dreiser's An American Tragedy were my favorites. For nonfiction, With The Old Breed: At Peleliu And Okinawa by Eugene B. Sledge is a deeply moving book. It is an account by a Marine WWII veteran of Pacific island warfare, told from his perspective as an infantryman. What makes it so special is his humility and humanity in recounting the horrors of combat, going into the kind of detail history books don't normally go into - such as battlefield sanitation, the dehumanizing effects of battle on the participants, of fear and of soldiers mentally cracking under the constant strain. I felt emotionally drained after reading it, and no other book has had such an effect.