The Battle of Cape Esperance: Encounter at Guadalcanal

Rating:
Summary: A battle won by the U. S. Navy in the Solomons.
Review: A nice little book about a battle between U.S. and Imperial Japanese Navy ships in Iron Bottom Sound. During this brief encounter the U.S. Navy sunk a Japanese cruiser and destroyer at a cost of a destroyer. Subsequent action by airplanes out of Henderson sunk an additional two Japanese destroyers.
Cook was a participant in this battle and goes into great detail about what happened. The U.S. Navy which had been rather lackluster up to this point, showed they were brave and ready to confront equal or superior forces. The result was the Japanese were bested in this battle, with moderate losses. They withdrew after completing their mission.
Since the book is short at only 150 pages, the reader can easily read this in a few hours and understand a little on the Guadalcanal campaign, especially the naval side.

Rating:
Summary: A battle won by the U. S. Navy in the Solomons.
Review: A nice little book about a battle between U.S. and Imperial Japanese Navy ships in Iron Bottom Sound. During this brief encounter the U.S. Navy sunk a Japanese cruiser and destroyer at a cost of a destroyer. Subsequent action by airplanes out of Henderson sunk an additional two Japanese destroyers.
Cook was a participant in this battle and goes into great detail about what happened. The U.S. Navy which had been rather lackluster up to this point, showed they were brave and ready to confront equal or superior forces. The result was the Japanese were bested in this battle, with moderate losses. They withdrew after completing their mission.
Since the book is short at only 150 pages, the reader can easily read this in a few hours and understand a little on the Guadalcanal campaign, especially the naval side.

Rating:
Summary: An excellent account of an overlooked battle.
Review: Popular mythology of the Solomons Campaign holds that the Japanese Navy was invincible at night and hopelessly outclassed the United States Navy. Read the average account of the battles in the Slot and you come away with the impression that the Japanese won them all, or at least all up until Second Guadalcanal.

Cook's book provides a fine, straightforward narrative of one of the early engagements which the US Navy, in fact, won. It's a readable, exciting book which also contains information useful to serious students of the war and campaign.