The first thing to remember is that we don't stock or sell books or anything else!

Since 1995, we've been a clearinghouse for information about books concerning World War II, the authors of those books, their publishers, and the new and secondhand booksellers who make those books available. In addition, we provide a wide range of book reviews, historical essays, an online WWII order-of-battle database, listings of books shows, an entertaining WWII Trivia Challenge, annual Top Ten voting to select the best books of the year, and more. We make all this information available at no charge via our website to anyone who's interested. Here's our guide to what we make available.

To "About Us" page

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Our "News & Information" page is really the center of the website. Almost every day we post something new to the page, so you'll find it a very dynamic and up-to-date source of book news. If you bookmark our website—please do!—the "News & Information" page is the best URL to mark.

The body of the "News & Information" page is a daily chronology of book intelligence, and this should usually be your starting point whenever you're exploring our site or seeking specific information. Here you'll find, in daily sequence, everything there is to know about the new and used WWII book business. The page contains entries for the current month and the previous month, with the older data being removed on the first day of the new month.

Those older months go off to separate pages, and they can be reached from the links at the bottom of the "News & Information" page. While much of the news from older months grows rapidly stale, you can also find useful book reviews, book surveys, and other valuable information that was presented in months gone past. See also the Archives section below.

To "News & Information" page

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This Directory page provides complete contact information for dozens of book publishers who specialize in or produce substantial numbers of volumes about the Second World War. The publishers themselves help keep this page current, and it serves as an "online yellow pages" for customers who want to contact them.

Besides the contact information (phone, fax, mail, email, URL), entries on the Directory also provide information about the publisher and often list several of the newest titles being offered. Some of these publishers sell directly to consumers; others will gladly direct you to retailers who can provide the books you want.

Following the hyperlinks on the Directory page will take you far beyond the bounds of our own website, but, hey, that's what the Web is all about.

If you are a publisher of World War II books—or know of one—who's not on our Directory, please notify us so we can correct that oversight. Standard entries on our list are free of charge (but we do require verification of your business).

To "Directory of Publishers" page

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We presently list over a hundred Web-based book retailers on our "Directory of Booksellers" page. Many of them specialize exclusively in books about WWII, others handle only military books, and a few are general stock booksellers with a strong inventory of Second World War titles.

Like the "Publisher Directory", this page contains complete information for contacting each business as well as further details such as area of specialization, whether or not they also have a walk-in bookstore, if they accept Want Lists, and sometimes list some of their more noteworthy titles currently for sale. Data on this directory is maintained by the booksellers themselves through our password-protected update system, so they are entirely responsible for its content as well as its accuracy and timeliness.

Most of these booksellers are wired for email, and all of them would like to hear from people who are interested in books about World War II. Nowadays most booksellers have their own websites (often with complete, regularly updated inventory pages) so they're very happy to have you surf over and check them out.

As with publishers, we want to maintain a comprehensive directory of the most important WWII booksellers. If you're a Web-based dealer of World War II books—or know of one—who's not on our Directory, please notify us so we can put you there. Entries on this Directory cost a very modest US$60.00 per year in order to help us defray costs associated with maintaining this website.

To "Directory of Booksellers" page

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Want to know what's up with your favorite WWII writer? Check our Directory of Authors page. Here we present many of the most popular authors and historians working in the field today. Each author's entry includes a brief list of his or her most important titles, mostly ones we've reviewed elsewhere at our site. Better yet, many of these writers have provided extra information on their own private pages within our Second World War Books system, so you can click on the "More Information" link to see the author's email address, the URL of his own books website, and—in many cases—news directly from the author about his latest WWII-related projects. Note that each author enters and edits his own information at his own private entry here through our password-protected update system, so he is entirely responsible for its content as well as its accuracy and timeliness.

If you're the author of a nonfiction WWII-related title in our online book database—our you think your book should be there—and you would like a free entry on the Directory of Authors page, please notify us so we can explain how this works.

To "Directory of Authors" page

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These are certainly the most extensive and data-rich pages at our website. They are designed to help readers, researchers, and collectors find complete bibliographic data for WWII-related books. You can access the book database via the "Books" tab or via the Quick-Finder feature, and links from the directories for authors, publishers, series, etc also lead to individual books within the bibliography.

Of course, remember the first sentence under "What we do": we don't  sell books! When you see a book listed in our bibliography, that doesn't mean we can sell it to you; you'll still need to contact a publisher or bookseller who can provide it. But, armed with data from our bibliographic pages, the contact information in our "Publisher Directory" and "Bookseller Directory", and our free "Book Search Service" page, your task should be much easier.

(We strive to include only reputable businesses in our databases, but it is your responsibility to make appropriate inquiries before purchasing anything. Caveat emptor.)

To "Bibliography" page

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While it's certainly possible to send out copies of your Wants List one by one to all the booksellers in our Directory, it's probably a whole lot easier to send your Wants through our free Book Search Service.

Using a very short and sweet HTML form, one mouse click on the "submit" button is sufficient to send your "desperately seeking" manifest to all our participating booksellers around the globe. These are the guys with the resources to find just about anything you need, and they're happy to do it at no charge. As soon as someone finds something you want, they'll reply to you via email with details on price, condition, shipping, etc.

Furthermore, if we don't hear back from you that you've successfully filled your needs, within about four to six weeks your wants will be automatically posted on our "Want Lists" page where other buyers and sellers can often help you.

(Note that all transactions are strictly between you and the bookseller. We strive to include only reputable businesses in our Search Service, but it is your responsibility to make appropriate inquiries before purchasing anything. Caveat emptor.)

To "Book Search Service" page

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Using this one-stop resource will automatically forward catalog requests to dozens of military book businesses.

Depending on the policies of the individual business, the number of catalogs they have on hand, the expected date of their next mass catalog mailing, your geographical location, and various other factors, you can expect to quickly receive a paper or digital catalog in response from most of these publishers and booksellers. Keep in mind, however, that mail order businesses simply cannot afford to continue filling catalog requests without receiving some orders in return, so please don't abuse this service if you have no expectation of placing an order.

To "Mailing list/catalog request" page

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We want to help people find and acquire non-fiction, WWII-related books. If you can supply those books, then we want to help you sell them.

If you are a book publisher, self-publisher, author, bookseller, or just someone who wants to liquidate some (or all) of a book collection, then we can help you promote and sell your books at no charge. To that end we have online forms available to gather information from you so that we can in turn pass that information along to our visitors.

To "Sell your books" page

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Almost every day we post fresh announcements about a wide variety of subjects to our "News & Information" page. As those announcements "roll off the bottom" of the page, they're saved for future reference and can be accessed through our "Archives" page. This page contains links to all the old monthly files of "News & Information."

To "Archives" page

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Just as we provide free information about WWII-related books, publishers, authors, and booksellers on our webpages, we can also send you this kind of information by email. If you'd like to subscribe to our free Second World War Books email newsletter, just complete and submit the newsletter form. About once each month we'll send news and information to help you keep abreast of what's happening in the field of new and used WWII books.

To "Newsletter" page

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In an average week we post one or two book reviews at our website. These are reviews of new, recent, and important older non-fiction WWII-related titles. Although these titles are almost invariably provided by the publishers, we're beholden to no one, and these are our honest, unbiased opinions of the books.

To "Book reviews" page

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These webpages are for our visitors to communicate with each other about WWII-related books. Visitors ask about books they want to acquire, describe books they want to sell, and inquire about various other topics. Once in awhile visitors even criticize our book reviews, if you can believe such a thing!

To "Book forum" pages

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Have you been keeping up with your Second World War reading? Just for fun, try our trivia challenge to see how much you really know about World War II. Questions are served randomly from our growing "TriviaBase", range from very easy to very hard, and the answers provide links to books for further reading.

To "Trivia Challenge" page

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This page, as with many of our features, is actually an online database served on demand to visitors who want to find out about the latest military book releases and upcoming military titles. Visitors can view the information arranged by author, title, publisher, and date of release.

In addition to providing information about release dates, the system allows you to request email notification when books are published. Just select the titles you're interested in, enter your email address (it won't be used for any other purpose or provided to anyone else), and as soon as the book is published you'll receive an email notification from us. No muss, no fuss. No charge, no obligation.

To "New & Forthcoming Books" page

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While not strictly book-related, this information is the result of much research in books about World War II. "Armies of the Second World War" is an online database of day-by-day orders of battle and information about hundreds of division, brigade, and regiment-sized units in World War II. Information currently available in the database covers Commonwealth, Dominion, Colonial, Exile, and "Minor" Allied armies in Europe, Africa, and western Asia from 1 September 1939 through 7 May 1945. As time permits, we hope to continue adding additional information for more units, more armies, and more theaters.

To "Armies of the Second World War" page

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Over the years we've written quite a few essays about WWII-related topics, and they're all collected here, including such obscure topics as the war between Siam and French Indochina in 1940 and 1941, Iceland in the Second World War, and the Invasion of British Somaliland. We also offer a photo album of more than 100 of the most important world political leaders from the years 1939-1945.

To "History" page

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Out of all the thousands of books we own, read, review, announce, and/or enjoy during our ongoing work on this website, some strike our fancy more than others. The "Recommended Reading" page is an eclectic selection of some of our personal favorites. They come and go whenever we feel like it. Just a page where we can share some of the titles that keep us feeling good about WWII-related books....

To "Recommended Reading" page

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