The Restless Wave

A Novel of the United States Navy

De: James Stavridis USN

Narrado por: Marc Cashman

“The Restless Wave is not only a stirring and gripping story of the sea, but also of love and war and leadership. Admiral Stavridis’s sweeping knowledge of history and life in the Navy shines on every page, imbuing this work with authenticity and power.”
—David Grann, #1 NYT bestselling author of Killers of the Flower Moon

“In the engaging tradition of Herman Wouk and Patrick O’Brian, Admiral James Stavridis has given us a fascinating novel of one young man’s—and one great nation’s—war at sea. The book is at once entertaining and illuminating, touching on the most fundamental of human themes with deftness and an appreciation of the immense achievements of the United States Navy in the deadliest of eras.” —Jon Meacham

From the New York Times bestselling former NATO commander comes a riveting historical novel that charts the coming-of-age of a gifted but immature young naval officer as he is tested in the crucible of World War II in the Pacific

Scott Bradley James arrives in Annapolis, Maryland, as a plebe in the class of 1941 without a terribly good idea why he wants to be a naval officer, other than that his father was a sailor, and he wants to see the world, whatever that means. Scott and his roommate become fast friends, and, after surviving scrapes of their own making, the two fetch up at Pearl Harbor. War is brewing, and their class has graduated early. They have been sent to battle stations.

Admiral James Stavridis is an acclaimed novelist, a decorated military leader, and a great student of military history. He draws on it all to capture the experience of being storm-tossed by the first bloody years of the Second World War. Scott Bradley James is a talented young officer, but he has a lot to learn. And war will have a lot to teach him.


The Restless Wave offers a gripping account of the U.S. Navy’s astonishing progress through the first three years of the war in the Pacific, from Pearl Harbor through to the Coral Sea, Midway, and Guadalcanal. A story of character under pressure in the harshest of proving grounds, it is written with careful fidelity to the truths of war that have made tales of the sea essential to the art of storytelling since Odysseus.

A fine story, well told by this talented officer!

I very much enjoyed the book. I was a bit surprised by the ending, but that’s how it should be.

I didn’t care for the narration at all. Narrators of books about the military should be coached in how to pronounce certain words. A corpsman is pronounced “core-man” NEVER corpse-man, but when the military time of 1000 (which should be read as ten hundred, not one thousand!) I just sat shaking my head! I hope the sequel has a better narrator.

Great nuance by the author telling the story.

I liked everything and particularly that there will be another sequel to complete the story.

The journey from adolescence to manhood.

There’s a demand for a more strategic approach on how naval officers make strategic decisions

It's as if John Grisham wrote a historical novel!

If John Grisham ever wrote a historical novel, this is how good it would turn out! The Restless Wave is a another masterpiece from Admiral James Stavridis. It weaves together key aspects of WWII through the eyes of a U.S. Navy officer protagonist who is working his way through life and his career. The author delivers a unique and engaging way of looking at WWII, and it's great that the book also brings a human side to this history as well. Give it a read or listen - you can't go wrong!

Well told, smoothly flowing story.

Learned of the book from the author’s discussion on Jack Carr’s podcast…which was outstanding…like they all are. Greatly looking forward to the next volume.
I grew to enjoy the narrator’s style…except for pronouncing the “s” in Corpsman.