1815 (The Sharpe Series - The Waterloo Campaign

The authors lack of bias and intelligent insights into the thinking of the participants ,was refreshing. At times while reading this history I almost felt anxious as I didn't know the outcome. Well done!

Bernard Cornwell is also an incredible author of history. Brings the land wars of the Napoleonic period to vivid life. I've read all the Sharpe series about the 95th Rifles. The Green Jackets. Obviously, they have a special place in Mr. Cornwell's heart and he instilled it in mine. And they play a big part at Waterloo. His depiction of the battle of Waterloo should be make into a movie. It's that riveting. Us history buffs all know the basic premise of the battle, but his analytical mind and his meticulous research explores it in a whole new way that is both exciting and leaves you yearning for the next chapter. BTW. this is the 200th anniversary of the Battle. I expect the re-enactors were there in force to make it a special occasion. I wanted to go, but was told a couple of years ago that only participants are welcome. No spectators! I bet Mr. Cornwell was there dressed as a British soldier. Probably as a Green Jacket. Thanks for asking.

A fitting way to understand the war of 1812. Napoleon scared Europe and massacred thousands of his soldiers at waterloo. No wonder the final battle ofthe1812 war amazed no one, looking forward to waterloo.

This is a very clear and well-written description of the battle. It was easy to follow the movements of the individual armies and their attacks. In addition, the author makes it clear he does not have any particular theories to prove, and shows why Wellington and others made the decisions they did. Napoleon does not come out well, however.

This is an excellent treatment of this critical event in world history. Since I am not a student of The Battle of Waterloo, I cannot compare it with other books on this subject. That said, if you want a well written account of this Battle that is easily followed and understood - this is a great choice.

Good piece. Made the battle understandable. Almost personal. I noted some repetition of certain insights, but actually appreciated them. They were properly in context, not simply added word count. Any criticisms I have read here are from people who are surely easily bothered by many things in life. For a quality battle narrative, read this book.

I had something of an internet is military history but I had no understanding of the western worlds most famous battle, this book provides that in some detail. At the beginning Napoleon is on the island of Elba and at the end on his way to St Helena. In between you get every significant event.

One of the significant hinges of European history. The story is so well told you are there. Bernard Cornwell is above all a great story teller of great stories and Waterloo is a great story. My only complaint is the maps on my Kindle were almost useless. I recommend the hardcopy version.

I loved this book. Bernard Cornwell is still a master in these types of books. That the book is written by an Englishman, he can not hide it. However, his writing is, as usual, extremely good and the facts, accurate to a point. For historians, there are better books, but for an entertainment and hard to put down books, this is excellent!

Cornwell once again stuns the reader with his research and great characters. However, this book and others leave the reader pondering why Napoleon waited until Waterloo to reorganize his traditional method of attacking an enemy, a shallow and pincer type thrust which led to huge casualties among his soldiers; and, instead switched to the British mode of attack and spread his men into more of a longer line where many more of his soldiers could use their weapons at once. Also, Napoleon, being hard-headed, still refused to adopt the rifle and continued to have his troops use the traditional musket. A truly great book.

Great description and analysis of a great battle! The author presents very well researched and balanced insights, though he is obviously a big fan of Wellington and the British infantry. Maps are useful, though a bit hard to read on Kindle. Now I need to re-read Sharpe's Waterloo by the same author in light of the larger battle insight I've gained here.

Bernard Cornwell is arguably one of the best writers of both historical fiction and, as in this book, actual historical accounts. His methodical, well-reasoned analysis of the massive, earthshaking events that transpired in Waterloo brings back to life the largest than life characters who participated in the battle, and provides a detailed and accurate road map of how the battle was conducted.

Three quarters of the way through this and loving it. I've read Bernard Cornwell's historical fiction and so I'm not surprised that this non-fiction book is just as terrific. He really brings all the battles and the strategies to life as well as all the principal players. I wish I had books like this when I was in school!

Bernard Cornwell is an excellent Waterloo historian; writes of the battle with intelligence and exceptional insight into the preliminary battles, personalities, terrain and weather that shaped the critical, incredibly hard-fought battle. Of especial interest, are Cornwell's precise recounting of the timetables, key terrain features across the sweep of the field, and the formations and tactics, both offensive and defensive, employed by the battlefield commanders on both sides.

Big battles are always confusing but Mr Cornwell teases out the strands in a manner that helps make sense of a hugely confusing moving picture. Eminently readable, solid characters and a sense of telling a story without blame except in the hubris of Napoleon. Thanks.

An excellent summary of the events around Waterloo by a man who knows how to write about war. One thing that is made very clear is how the outcome can hinge on inexplicable decisions. This battle was Napoleon's to lose,and he did, somehow. Some of the decisions made by his commanders are very hard to explain in retrospect, but doubtless made sense at the time. The Fog of War is real, and it is a truism that no plan survives contact with the enemy. One thing that continues to astonish me about this sort of war, very up-close and personal, is the discipline of the soldiers. They stood the line and just took it. Cavalry charges, cannon fire, they held their line, or their square, and did their job.

A splendid book. Definitely not a boring recitation of this unit went to that place, but brings the battle alive the way front line soldiers and their generals experienced it. The author carefully cuts through the myths and fog of war, to explain what really happened and why. Highly recommended.

The author is very repetitive and the work is somewhat hard to follow. The maps are less than clear and helpful. Overall, the author is a good story teller and mixes in some very interesting military info and factors I had not been aware of. I would reccommend this book, but it wasn't my favorite.

Well worth a read for those into military history and tactics.
My favorite part is the use of first person accounts, including dealing with where they contradict each other.
The only negative for me was maps did not all have the names of all the places referenced. A minor issue.

The first real book I have read about Waterloo. It lays out a complex story in a very readable fashion. I had some trouble going back and forth to the maps probably due to the kindle format, but still very glad that I got and read the book.

Carefully put together to bring you right into each battle as if you were actually there. Highly recommend to anyone interested in the history of military battles and the tactics and leadership involved in their progression. A truly enjoyable informative read.

Well done. Enough detail so you know the battle without bogging down into stuff only "Waterloo nerds" could care about. Needs more maps and there is a confusing mix of present and past tense in places. But all in all, a sensational and fine book.

I had always heard about Waterloo, but really never knew more than the broadest outlines of the story. Cornwell has educated me in an informative and entertaining narrative. I recommend the book to anyone interested in the story of Waterloo.

Excellent. A brisk and entertaining read. Was a neophyte when it came to the details of the battle, but found Cornwell's narrative very engaging. Further research has confirmed the accuracy of Cornwell's description of events. Suffers a bit from a primarily English point-of-view, but I figured that would be the case and so it didn't bother me.

Bernard Cornwell is a great author of historical fiction and shows himself to be a great author of history. I have read many books on Waterloo through the years and this is absolutely one of the best. I enjoy getting the Commanders view down to the common soldier's and this has plenty of it. This isn't a dry historical account of the battle, it reads somewhat like a novel.

I read this series, start to finish. Chronological order. Every book is excellent . the story in full is excellent.
All winter, rainy days, fireplace, coffee, cookies. Great time spent with wonderful characters, good and bad.
The stories built into history lessons were just masterful.
Sorry, Do to so many read, I am copying one review for all. Singularly or Collectively, you can not go wrong with Bernard Cornwell.

Bernard Cornwell’s “Waterloo” is a superb history of the June 1815 battle; rich in detail, highly entertaining, masterfully organized, easily understanding of the more deadly refinements of early 19th century warfare, including great plates of artistic representations (e.g., “The Duke of Wellington,” by Thomas Lawrence, Lady Butler’s “Scotland Forever” (1881), Gibb’s “Closing the Gates of Hougoumont, 1815 (1906)). For Cornwell, well known for his historical fiction (“Sharpe’s Waterloo,” for example), this is his first "non fiction" book and the book came out in England in time for the battle’s 200th anniversary in mid June. It was easily a best seller. The reviewer’s book was a paperback version and bought in Canada.

Waterloo as a battle has none of the simplicities of directness of, say, Gettysburg; it is complex, with three armies, a multitude of regiments, brigades, different generals (with foreign names) and the myriad sweep of various landscapes and sites of battle and telling and informative maps.

Reading this book is like having ocean waves of history wash over the reader scene after scene, battle after battle (Quatre-Bras, Ligny, Hougoumont, La Haie Sante, the advance of the Imperil Guard) punch forward without prediction of outcome (yet knowing its outcome). Wellington centric, respectful of the contribution of General von Blücher, filled with contemporaneous diary entries of the warriors, and highly readable, Cornwell makes the case for Wellington’s heroism, his fearlessness and tactical genius, the horrors of battle and defeat, the razor's edge of victory, and the justified historical opprobrium of Napoleon’s final battle despite, in Cornwell’s clever aside at the end, about Napoleon’s lasting fame which resides on that “mythical plane where the French are not beaten fairly and squarely, but are victims of a cosmic fate.”

Nobody does it any better than Cornwell. This is the second account of Waterloo I have read and it is the best by far. You understand how close the battle was to going in the other direction. In war there are winners and losers. The great generals involved in this fight were both accustomed to victory. This battle changed the history of Europe.

Cornwell writes a good story but there is too much repetition as though he doesn't trust his readers to get it the first, or even the second time. I have heard that Cornell's novels are very good. Perhaps he should stick to writing fiction.

Very good book with lots of very interesting detail. Sometimes a tad confusing because not a lot of maps in the online version. Still learned a lot about a battle that I knew little of. Writing was very easy to follow.

It's an enjoyable read. Cornwall does a good job of interweaving historical events and Sharpe's personal story. Having said that, it's a very anglocentric version of Waterloo. Gneissenau and Prince of Orange are both portrayed in a very negative light and very little credit is given to the Prussian contribution for the victory. Since this is fiction I rated this four stars because it's a great story. I would only rate this three stars for its historical content.

I enjoyed the account of the Battle of Waterloo. More so as where wimps failed Colonel Sharpe helped to save the day for The Duke of Wellington. Just sorry that Jane didn't get to loose all the money she had stolen from Sharpe.

Only one to go for me in the Series. I have enjoyed Sharpe's escapades as I enjoyed Hornblower's those far off years ago.

Love Cornwall, but this read more like a history text than a story. Would have liked more insight into the individual experiences of the battle and military life in the early 19th century. Still, an enjoyable read.

This is one of my favorites, for the famous scenery, notorious characters, and Sharpe getting the recognition he deserves along the way. I appreciate the author's attention to historical detail and I like his character development.

Excellent historical account of the battle of Waterloo. An overconfident Napoleon grossly underestimates Lord Wellington and is routed in probably the famous battle on world history. A must read for military history lovers.

I have always loved book's on history but most are very dry read with the dates and statistics all the author seems to care about . Cornwell does a marvelous job of creating the feeling and emotions that the men went through and still gets the facts across in an entertaining way.

I saw the movie WATERLOO as a child which featured Rod Steiger as Napoleon and Christopher Plummer as Wellington. There is a scale feature of the battle at the Army Museum in Chelsea and the historical detail in this book is spot on. Sharpe's antics add a bit of adventure to the story, but it's a must read, can't put down" kind of a book.

Well written and researched. Balanced views and analysis of both victor and those they defeated. Graphic and sometimes gruesome accounts of early 19th century warfare as experienced by generals and the lowly privates.

Cornwell's history is not groundbreaking in any way. Written to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the battle, the book is, however, engaging. The battlefield commanders and soldiers emerge as fully human and if little can be said that is new about a battle that is the English equivalent of Gettysburg, endlessly studied and commented upon, Cornwell nevertheless tells the story well and memorably.

Could very well be. Accompanied by wonderful reproductions of artwork and maps depicting the battle's progress, the author stitches together a magnificent picture of the strategic, tactical and human events of Waterloo. A page-turner; I couldn't put it down.

The most readable and enjoyable historical review I have read. The style of the author draws one in to this incredible saga of human conflict set in a time when honor, bravery and self-sacrifice seemed to be valued over human rights. The report is well balanced and obviously well researched. Coming, as it does, after so many reports on the same event - takes account of the numerous opinions and perceptions offered by other researchers and observers of the battles.

A great narrative description of the Battle of Waterloo. Bernard provides an analysis and interpretation of the events. The maps were very good showing locations not visible on other maps in other books. My only quibble was a missing index of the maps.

After reading most of the Sharpe series, I began to find Cornwell's battle scenes very tedious reading indeed. If I were asked, I would recommend that only 3 or 4 off these meticulously researched books be read at one stretch. The historical notes are important collateral reading, and access to Google/Wikipedia is important as well. Quite aside the entertainment value, I found the series quite educational.

I enjoyd and learned from Richard Shape's presence at the Battle of Waterloo. I understand that there is more than one way to interpret the facts and that there are disagreements within contemporary accounts, but in Bernard Cornwell's narrative, there is a strong consistent story line that is easy to follow and there is a deep respect for the lives lost.

First history I have read of waterloo and the decision that went into the battle - interesting book for an interesting battle. Kinda unique given Cornwell's penchent for fictional versions of battles. Overall quite good.

I had some vague general knowledge of the battle before reading the book but it really helped clarify the sequence and chronology of the battle and the causes and effects of the decisions made by the main participants.

The best written account of the battle and those involved. The people come alive here and the accounts of the battles and the decisions made of when, where,and how to fight them are so excellently described I cannot but not recommend this book. Cornwell is at his best here.

This book cannot be viewed as a definitive scholarly masterpiece by any stretch. As a matter of fact, based on the authors decades of tomes dealing with this period, I wouldn't be surprised if he wrote it during a long weekend with his eyes closed. So what if he made a quick buck, because you know what, it's an excellent book.

The book is filed with tons (or should I say tonnes) of fascinating primary source quotes. It is exceptionally easy to read due, of course, to the fact that the author is essentially a novelist. The art work (portraits of the battle) is amazingly bright and clear. The text is fluid, concise and at times almost reads like a thriller.

If you want a truly scholarly Waterloo epic with all the possible details of the battle rendered within, this book may not be for you. As for me, I hope Cornwell writes many more histories.

This is the first of Bernard Cromwell’s books that I have read that are strictly historical as opposed to historical fiction. Whereas it was a very good book, I believe I enjoyed the Sharpe series Waterloo book more.

Seems to be a comprehensive and historically honest account of the battle. Not much back story, but that's ok. The actual blow-by-blow is so bloody that I felt exhausted by the end of the book, kind of like the participants.

This is the first historical novel of the Napoleonic era that I have read. It is fantastic and the historical references contained within the story of Mr. Sharp's adventures leading up to and during the battle of Waterloo make this book the type that you do not want to put down. I read it in one sitting!!
Great story.

Great and amazing read.The thirty eight year old is recalled to active service because Boney is back. So is Harper and that selfish witch, Jane.

This is a real war story. The battles, the politics . The everything. Cromwell takes real history and presenting it in a way to make it so wonderful that you will want to learn the real story.

This well researched history of the Batt, e of Waterloo is interesting and very readable. Cornwell uses personal accounts and historical documents to present a detailed but easy flowing account of the battle that is useful for both the amateur and professional historian.

...details how the battle was conducted, the weapons used and the men who led, killed, were killed. The paintings at the end of each chapter serve as photographs before cameras were invented. Highly recommend.