1) I'm reading Nathaniel Fick's ONE BULLET AWAY: The Making of a Marine Officer and it is a compelling piece of writing. Fick commanded the Marine Recon platoon that Rolling Stone reporter Evan Wright embedded with to report on the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Wright's RS articles were the foundation for the book and later HBO series, GENERATION KILL. Recommended for G-KILL fans, military historians and anyone interested in a view of the "terror war" from the ground.
2) Fick's old unit, the Marine's 1st Reconaissance Battalion is what's known in the US military as a "special operations force". Anyone wanting to get an idea of the training and mindset of SOF officers (like, say, STARGATE fanfic writers *cough*) might find Fick's book interesting.
3) Finally read A VENETIAN AFFAIR wherein I learned, not for the first time, that the course of true love ne'er does run smooth, 18th century Venetian patricians were kinky, and the Catholic Church in Venice used to keep a registry of secret marriages while French convents were a convenient place to conceal an illicit pregnancy.
4) When I finish OBA, I will only have to read three more books before I'm allowed to bring any new ones into my house (library books don't count).
5) I buy too many books.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}