Help Support the NBN and NBN en Español on Patreon | Visit New Books Network en Español!

New Books Network

About AJ Woodhams

\

AJ Woodhams hosts the "War Books" podcast. You can subscribe on Apple here and on Spotify here. War Books is on YouTube, Facebook and Instagram.

AJ's website

NBN Episodes hosted by AJ:

Military History September 17, 2023

Bismarck's War

The Franco-Prussian War and the Making of Modern Europe

Rachel Chrastil

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Among the conflicts that convulsed Europe during the nineteenth century, none was more startling and consequential than the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871. Deliberately engineered by Prussian chancellor Otto von Bismarck …
German Studies September 8, 2023

Beyond the Wall

A History of East Germany

Katja Hoyer

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
In 1990, a country disappeared. When the Iron Curtain fell, East Germany ceased to be. For over forty years, from the ruin of the Second World War to the cusp …
Military History September 3, 2023

Out of Mesopotamia

Salar Abdoh

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Saleh, the narrator of Out of Mesopotamia (Akashic Books, 2020), is a middle-aged Iranian journalist who moonlights as a writer for one of Iran's most popular TV shows but cannot keep …
Military History August 17, 2023

Putin's War on Ukraine

Russia’s Campaign for Global Counter-Revolution

Samuel Ramani

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
Eight years after annexing Crimea, Russia embarked on a full-scale invasion of neighboring Ukraine in February 2022. For Vladimir Putin, this was a legacy-defining mission--to restore Russia's sphere of influence …
Military History August 11, 2023

Goodbye, Eastern Europe

An Intimate History of a Divided Land

Jacob Mikanowski

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
Eastern Europe, the moniker, has gone out of fashion since the fall of the Soviet Union. Ask someone now, and they might tell you that Estonia is in the Baltics …
Military History August 4, 2023

The War Came To Us

Life and Death in Ukraine

Christopher Miller

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
When Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his unprovoked, full-scale invasion of Ukraine just before dawn on 24 February 2022, it marked his latest and most overt attempt to brutally conquer …
Military History July 30, 2023

Uncertain Ground

Citizenship in an Age of Endless, Invisible War

Phil Klay

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
When Phil Klay left the Marines a decade ago after serving as an officer in Iraq, he found himself a part of the community of veterans who have no choice …
Military History July 22, 2023

Conquistadors and Aztecs

A History of the Fall of Tenochtitlan

Stefan Rinke

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Five hundred years ago, a flotilla landed on the coast of Yucatán under the command of the Spanish conquistador Hérnan Cortés. While the official goal of the expedition was to …
Russian and Eurasian Studies July 14, 2023

Memory Makers

The Politics of the Past in Putin's Russia

Jade McGlynn

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
Why aren't ordinary Russians more outraged by Putin's invasion of Ukraine? Inside the Kremlin's own historical propaganda narratives, Russia's invasion of Ukraine makes complete sense. From its World War II …
Military History July 11, 2023

The Russo-Ukrainian War

The Return of History

Serhii Plokhy

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
Despite repeated warnings from the White House, Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 shocked the world. Why did Putin start the war--and why has it unfolded in previously unimaginable …
Literature July 2, 2023

The Torqued Man

A Novel

Peter Mann

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
Today I talked to Peter Mann about his book The Torqued Man (Harper Perennial, 2022). Berlin—September, 1945. Two manuscripts are found in rubble, each one narrating conflicting versions of the life of an …
Military History June 24, 2023

V Is For Victory

Franklin Roosevelt's American Revolution and the Triumph of World War II

Craig Nelson

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
As Nazi Germany began to conquer Europe, America’s military was unprepared, too small, and poorly supplied. The Nazis were supported by robust German factories that created a seemingly endless flow …
Literature June 18, 2023

The Postcard

Anne Berest

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
Winner of the Choix Goncourt Prize, Anne Berest's The Postcard (Europa Editions, 2023) is a vivid portrait of twentieth-century Parisian intellectual and artistic life, an enthralling investigation into family secrets, and poignant …
Military History June 10, 2023

Iron and Blood

A Military History of the German-Speaking Peoples Since 1500

Peter H. Wilson

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
German military history is typically viewed as an inexorable march to the rise of Prussia and the two world wars, the road paved by militarism and the result a specifically …
Military History June 2, 2023

I Saw Death Coming

A History of Terror and Survival in the War Against Reconstruction

Kidada E. Williams

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Listen:
The story of Reconstruction is often told from the perspective of the politicians, generals, and journalists whose accounts claim an outsized place in collective memory. But this pivotal era looked …
Military History May 28, 2023

Brotherhood of the Flying Coffin

The Glider Pilots of World War II

Scott McGaugh

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
This book distills war down to individual young men climbing into defenseless gliders made of plywood, ready to trust the towing aircraft that would pull them into enemy territory by …
Military History May 22, 2023

A Stranger in Your Own City

Travels in the Middle East's Long War

Ghaith Abdul-Ahad

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
The history of reportage has often depended on outsiders--Ryszard Kapuściński witnessing the fall of the shah in Iran, Frances FitzGerald observing the aftermath of the American war in Vietnam. What …
Military History May 17, 2023

Age of Danger

Keeping America Safe in an Era of New Superpowers, New Weapons, and New Threats

Thom Shanker and Andrew Hoehn

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Again and again, American taxpayers are asked to open their wallets and pay for a national security machine that costs $1 trillion operate. Yet time and time again, the US …
Literature May 7, 2023

The World and All That It Holds

A Novel

Aleksandar Hemon

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Today I talked to Aleksandar Hemon about his new novel The World and All That It Holds (MCD, 2023). As the Archduke Franz Ferdinand arrives in Sarajevo one June day in 1914 …
Military History May 5, 2023

Putin's Wars

From Chechnya to Ukraine

Mark Galeotti

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
Mark Galeotti's book Putin's Wars: From Chechnya to Ukraine (Bloomsbury, 2022) is a timely overview of the conflicts in which Russia has been involved since Vladimir Putin became prime minister and …
Military History April 29, 2023

The Vortex

A True Story of History's Deadliest Storm, an Unspeakable War, and Liberation

Scott Carney and Jason Miklian

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
In November 1970, a storm set a collision course with the most densely populated coastline on Earth. Over the course of just a few hours, the Great Bhola Cyclone would …
Military History April 25, 2023

The Great New York Fire of 1776

A Lost Story of the American Revolution

Benjamin L. Carp

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
New York City, the strategic center of the Revolutionary War, was the most important place in North America in 1776. That summer, an unruly rebel army under George Washington repeatedly …
Military History April 23, 2023

The Long Reckoning

A Story of War, Peace, and Redemption in Vietnam

George Black

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
The American war in Vietnam has left many long-lasting scars that have not yet been sufficiently examined. The worst of them were inflicted in a tiny area bounded by the …
Military History April 21, 2023

The Dirty Tricks Department

Stanley Lovell, the OSS, and the Masterminds of World War II Secret Warfare

John Lisle

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
In the summer of 1942, Stanley Lovell, a renowned industrial chemist, received a mysterious order to report to an unfamiliar building in Washington, D.C. When he arrived, he was led …