Rating: 
Summary: I, like many Americans, blame Mr. Rooney For WWII
Review: The year was 1943 and I had been in a foxhole for three months. Was I in France? Belgum? Poland? No, I was in New Jersey - and it as all Andy Rooney's fault. Ya see, back in the summer of '42, Andy (or "The Dodger" as we "boys" "called" "him") had convinced me that the "Krauts" (or the "lungers") were planning to launch an invasion (or "yoodle party") of Jersey (or "iutyggfs"). He was wrong then and, by golly, he's wrong now!The book? Didn't read it. Don't have time for that sorta nonsense. Durn no good neighor kids keep climbing the fence into my yard. I'll show them. Just like I showed the Japanese at Dunkirk!
Rating: 
Summary: This is a really good book....
Review: This is a really good book, and I'm not sure that these reviews so far have done this justice.... First, to make the point, I was raised in a house in which my mother had bought, I believe, every one of the books that he had written to date. I am accustomed to his voice and like the fact that he pretty much sums up the world as he sees it (he scathes-- at least scratches at-- Tom Brokaw's 'The Greatest Generation' in the second version of this book: Brokaw who WROTE THE PREFACE....) His voice is ironic, thoughtful, and that of an old crumrudgeon-- what you'd expect after having listened to him since time immorial on 60 Minutes... He details his triumphs, travails, and low moments in the course of being a sergeant for 'Stars and Stripes' during World War II. He doesn't glorify war, praise anyone out of want to preserve history, and has a neat way of telling a story. He saw a lot in the time he served. Thus, this is a war memoir of the first degree.... Another book that fans of this book might like is called 'Infantry Soldier' which is a memoir of an American soldier who fought in the Battle of the Bulge.... I'm not sure who the author is.... but this also, is a worthwhile read.... Buy this!
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting book, narrow-minded at times
Review: This is an interesting book to read, for the tangential impressions of life in London, and with the Allied invasion of Europe, and even brief stays in India and China, during World War II by former Stars and Stripes reporter Andy Rooney.
The title, "My War," does not indicate possession as another reviewer thought, but indicates that this is a memoir. The book is full of anecdotal, and broader, observations of the war effort and those involved in it.
However, Rooney's opinion seems a bit too self-important at times, considering his own personal judgment of a situation or person as the final and authoritative word on the subject. He tends to paint those he meets and hears about as totally "good" or "bad."
It could be that, in print, Rooney can't convey the wry "just kidding" tone he verbally communicates in his TV commentaries. Rooney's inability to convey tone leaves the reader puzzled after reading such truly bizarre Rooney statements as "Let me assure you the state of the helicopter art, even the best there is, to this day is primitive. The big Sikorsky, for instance, had that small propeller mounted on the tail.... This small mechanical necessity alone leaves helicopters in the class of Mickey Mouse inventions."
You'll find this an interesting, and somewhat quick, read, but not on your "must read" list.
Rating:
Summary: This would make a great movie
Review: This is how W.W.II was for Mr. Andy Rooney. This is HIS personal experiences and HIS thoughts on same. Stars and Stripes reporters by the very nature of their jobs probably saw more of the war than anyone else. So not only are we treated to a view of the the war from a different perspective other than the soldier's but a view broader in scope and content. He was there when many historical events were unfolding. He met and interviewed many many people, big and small. He went into the concentration camps hours after they were liberated. Buchenwald and Thekla. "Buchenwald represented the worst of everything in all the Nazi extermination camps. The dead and dying were still everywhere. The camp was unchanged, still the way it had been for all
those terrible months except that there were cameramen there now, documenting the horror of it for all time." "The burned and blackened bodies of about sixty men were hanging in contorted positions from needle-point barbs of the wire. ...When the SS troops realized U.S. soldiers were going to
arrive in Thekla within hours, they herded 300 prisoners into one of the barracks. They threw pails of gasoline over the barracks and onto some of the prisoners and then tossed
incendiary grenades into the building." " Walking the same road a day or so after a tank had passed through, I would often come upon the gruesome sight of the whole halves of four or five men, and four or five halves of what
had been men, mashed into the dirt and mud by the grinding tracks of a ten-ton tank." He's talking about our tanks here rolling over our dead. Mr. Rooney puts W.W.II into more of a human ground level perspective. He shows you details, such as the many animal who suffered. Cows wandering the fields with painful utters
swollen with milk and no one there to milk them..... Horses and mules mowed down in battle. Abandoned pets. I learned a few things here. I'm happy I read the book. Mr. R is up-front and honest and that's all that counts. He's not afraid to speak his mind like most people, thank god! I love him
(his opinions 99% of the time are mine). This would make a great movie. I envy his life. Hell, as he scrambled behind a French farmers stone wall to avoid heavy German artillery fire he found himself in the company of Ernest
Hemingway! Just him and Ernie out there. Ernie telling Rooney where the other danger points were ahead of them.
Rating:
Summary: Touching and Fascinating
Review: Young Andy Rooney was not always the acerbic commentator that television viewers know best from SIXTY MINUTES. After reading this memoir, MY WAR, written by him, it is easy to see that he grew up in the best traditions of 19th and 20th Century America. As a result of this upbringing, the young Rooney viewed life through a prism of morality and right and wrong. After he was inducted as a soldier in World War II, he was lucky enough to be assigned, for reasons that make little sense, to the famous Armed Forces newspaper, the STARS & STRIPES. Without a doubt, had he not ended up on the staff of this newspaper, he would not have had his subsequent civilian career as a reporter. A consequence of this Army assignment, in his role of reporter, Rooney was a witness to some of the most significant actions of this war, including the liberation of the Nazi concentration camps. Very aptly titled, this memoir is the story of World War II as observed from Rooney's unexpected bird's eye view. It is a personal history, written in his own inimitable and riveting style. The report he gives readers of "his" war is fascinating and touching. This book should not be missed by anyone with a serious interest in this most pivotal event of the 20th Century.
Rating:
Summary: Touching and Fascinating
Review: Young Andy Rooney was not always the acerbic commentator that television viewers know best from SIXTY MINUTES. After reading this memoir, MY WAR, written by him, it is easy to see that he grew up in the best traditions of 19th and 20th Century America. As a result of this upbringing, the young Rooney viewed life through a prism of morality and right and wrong. After he was inducted as a soldier in World War II, he was lucky enough to be assigned, for reasons that make little sense, to the famous Armed Forces newspaper, the STARS & STRIPES. Without a doubt, had he not ended up on the staff of this newspaper, he would not have had his subsequent civilian career as a reporter. A consequence of this Army assignment, in his role of reporter, Rooney was a witness to some of the most significant actions of this war, including the liberation of the Nazi concentration camps. Very aptly titled, this memoir is the story of World War II as observed from Rooney's unexpected bird's eye view. It is a personal history, written in his own inimitable and riveting style. The report he gives readers of "his" war is fascinating and touching. This book should not be missed by anyone with a serious interest in this most pivotal event of the 20th Century.
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