Terrible Victory

First Canadian Army and the Scheldt Estuary Campaign, September 13–November 6, 1944

By: Mark Zuehlke

Narrated by: James Conlan

Length: 17 hrs and 7 mins

Publisher's summary

On September 4, 1944, Antwerp, Europe’s largest port, fell to the Second British Army and it seemed the war would soon be won. But Antwerp was of little value unless the West Scheldt Estuary linking it to the North Sea was also in Allied hands. In his greatest blunder of the war, Field Marshal Montgomery turned his back on the port, leaving the First Canadian Army to fight its way up the long coastal flank. By the time the Canadians and others serving with them reached the area, it had been transformed into a fortress manned by troops ordered to fight to the death. Crushing the Nazi defenders required all of the Canadians’ courage, endurance and skill. The battle that raged until November was Canada’s bloodiest of World War II, costing more than 6,000 casualties.

©2007 Mark Zuehlke (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

Detailed and entertaining...

Would you consider the audio edition of Terrible Victory to be better than the print version?

Haven't read the print version.

What did you like best about this story?

The personal narratives enliven an, at times, dreary recounting of a fascinating and under-reported campaign.

What did you like about the performance? What did you dislike?

The narrator is NOT familiar with military terms ("coy" is company, for example) and basic mispronunciations of other words grated.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

Up Scheldt Creek without a paddle!

A recording that does not do this work justice

Another great installment in Zuehlke’s series (though hard to digest without a map handy), but poorly brought to audio format by the narrator. Odd inflection and emphasis throughout (not quite monotone, but close) and repeated mispronunciation of names, Roman numerals, abbreviations, and even common English words (for instance, “Hamilton,” the letters “HLI,” “short lived,” and “behemoth” should not be difficult for a professional narrator). I had high hopes for this recording but was disappointed.

narrator needs work

the narrator was good but very annoying to hear him pronounce Regina wrong, and on every occasion. It's not pronounced
"Re-jean-na" . It's "Reg-eye-na". not complicated. and a little disheartening to when telling stories about the brave men who died in the Regina Rifles.

however the book was good as are all of the the writers other books

Worth your time

We have hindsight now and think the campaign and actions could have been fought differently.
But the books by Mark dispell this, he uses the war diaries of the units involved with veteran accounts.
People fawn over the generals - they should pay more attention to the men in waterlogged slit trenches who fought for our today.

Excellent book and well read

All books of this kind can fall into the trap of simply listing events one after the other in order to achieve enough detail. This book managed to provide sufficient detail about unique names designations and army formations stop. The narrative moves forward at a good pace and there is a nice mixture of strategic information and personal experience to provide a good read. The inclusion of names of the particular participants especially those that lost their lives is especially important. I highly recommend this book about a subject little disgust from the allies side. One side of the story becomes very clear is that Montgomery was hugely at fault for leaving the battle to clear Antwerp as a usable port and caused huge suffering for troops and civilians which was unnecessary. I highly recommend this interesting and fulfilling book.