Private

499 pp. The story opens in Europe in the late fall of 1944. Private Lester Atwell's outfit, an inexperienced infantry company, is stationed near Metz. The men have never been in action, and the sweep of the advance units across France in the previous summer has prepared everyone's mind for the probability that the war will be over before Christmas. Then, in mid-December, the German counterattack, later called the Battle of the Bulge, strikes the Ardennes and the region south of it. Atwell's company receives its baptism of fire. The story told in Private spans the few months between that time and VE Day.