Another excellent work by Neiberg. Handles the complex diplomatic tangle of French, Allies, and Germans in a coherent fashion. His breakdown of rivalries in Resistance movement also well done. Builds novel-like tension as the fate of Paris hangs in the balance. ( )

The book is a good popular synthesis of the Liberation of Paris in the context of the campaign for France in 1944. While weak on operational detail and very broad brush on the quite baroque French politics, it does a workmanlike job of integrating the multiple French, German and Allied points of view. It is especially to be commended for meticulously debunking the ‘Is Paris Burning’ legends of earlier eras of World War Two writings. The author is also to be commended for making clear the key roles of contingency and individual personality in the events portrayed. There is a tendency for military history to be written as if it were describing a chess match where all the pieces and possible moves are known to the players. Instead the key personalities are shown as human beings juggling multiple demands on their time and trying to make decisions with imperfect information and balky subordinates and superiors. Thus Leclerc was a subordinate divisional commander in an American army, the commander of a separate national force and De Gaulle’s man on the scene. The book shows him juggling all three roles and his American superiors forced to deal with him being both a subordinate and a separate national commander. ( )