The Greatest War Stories Ever Told

""Valor is of no service, chance rules all, and the bravest often fall by the hands of cowards,"" wrote Tacitus in A.D. 54. Chance, or fate, pervades war literature, Lamar Underwood (On Dangerous Ground) observes in an introduction to his anthology The Greatest War Stories Ever Told: Twenty-four Incredible War Tales from, among others, the American Revolution, the Spanish Civil War and Vietnam. This collection includes fiction and nonfiction by Victor Hugo, Leo Tolstoy, Bruce Catton, Rudyard Kipling, Ernest Hemingway, Erich Maria Remarque, William Faulkner, Martin Russ, Michael Herr and S.L.A. Marshall, on battles ranging from Waterloo and Antietam to the Chosin River in Korea. Serious war literature enthusiasts will already be familiar with many of these selections, but as the title promises, this is a greatest-hits compilation, intended for newer fans. ( July)