Donovan's Devils

OSS Commandos Behind Enemy Lines - Europe, World War II

By: Albert Lulushi

Narrated by: Noah Michael Levine

The stirring, little-known story of the forerunners to today's Special Forces.

The OSS - Office of Strategic Services - created under the command of William Donovan, has been celebrated for its cloak-and-dagger operations during World War II and as the precursor of the CIA. As the "Oh So Social", it has also been portrayed as a club for the well-connected before, during, and after the war. Donovan's Devils tells the story of a different OSS, that of ordinary soldiers, recruited from among first- and second-generation immigrants, who volunteered for dangerous duty behind enemy lines and risked their lives in Italy, France, the Balkans, and elsewhere in Europe.

Organized into Operational Groups, they infiltrated into enemy territory by air or sea and operated for days, weeks, or months hundreds of miles from the closest Allied troops. They performed sabotage, organized native resistance, and rescued downed airmen, nurses, and prisoners of war. Their enemy showed them no mercy, and sometimes their closest friends betrayed them. They were the precursors to today's Special Forces operators.

Based on declassified OSS records, personal collections, and oral histories of participants from both sides of the conflict, Donovan's Devils provides the most comprehensive account to date of the Operational Group activities, including a detailed narrative of the ill-fated Ginny mission, which resulted in the one of the OSS's gravest losses of the war.

Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in history - books about World War II, the Third Reich, Hitler and his henchmen, the JFK assassination, conspiracies, the American Civil War, the American Revolution, gladiators, Vikings, ancient Rome, medieval times, the old West, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times best seller or a national best seller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2016 Albert Lulushi (P)2016 Audible, Inc.

Good not great book and narration.

The narrator had a commanding albeit inflexibile voice that keeps your attention, but offers nothing new. The story itself is a fascinating look into American covert operations in WW2, specifically with a focus on the European theater. It details harrowing stories and the exceptional mission of soldiers conducting espionage and 5th column actions. The downfall is the story looses itself in the background of ww2 often devoting too much to the generic history of ww2 which is ironic, because one of the first things the author complains about, is not enough time to tell the millions of stories. If only he had realized that his main audience would be those that already know ww2 and don't need a repeat history lesson, he could've fit a fair bit more into the book. The ending note is ironic too, how all of the success in ww2 culminated in the US intelligence success in Afghanistan and US victory(lol yeah thats a little outta place now). Otherwise a good read and highly recommend

An interesting look at the OSS in the ETO

I hate to leave a critical comment, but in this case I must. This audiobook focuses primarily on Italy and a bit in other parts of the ETO, but fails to give a full sense of the OSS’s work. Instead it gets bogged down in minutiae.

On top of this, the narrator, who in other respects is good, mispronounced so many words that it grated on the nerves. I don’t just mean difficult ones, but rather very common ones that he should have looked up how to pronounce before starting such a project, like Wehrmacht! That error ultimately rests with the producer and editor.

“Wild Bill Donovan: The Last Hero” by Anthony Cave Brown is a far better choice.

Need to make movies about Donavon

Amazing stories of the OSS. Fascinating! It almost reads like a novel. Movies need to be made on this.

great book

very detailed information about covert action in WWII. For any history buff this is a good read.

excellent and a great read

excellent a a wealth of information acot OSS and the early Cia birth. Great about what went on in Italy during the war.

Somewhat Bumpy Read Through Various Adventures

Reading Donovan’s Devils reminded me of watching a fireworks show: there are lots of rockets and some explode into brilliant bursts, some go up and sort of fizzle and some are just duds. This book tells the story of multiple OSS operations and goes into great detail on some of them, and scant detail on others, and seriously, some of the operations just aren’t that interesting. Large passages provide details of general military operations not related to the OSS, as a framework for the various clandestine operations, and the overall read is a bit bumpy as the reader zigs in and out of the OSS world. The narration is smooth, consistently unattenuated throughout the book, which makes the listen sort of boring. Think of a movie without any underlying dramatic underscore, instead with a steady tone at the same frequency throughout the movie. If you want an overview of some of the activities of the OSS this book does the job, but without much excitement.

Historically Significant

Important operational details, not a broad brush overview or "glorious" rendition of history. Well done.

Good, informative

This book was good and gave a lot of interesting details. I only wish it would have given information on other theaters as well.

Noah Michael Levine reading ruins the story

If one is going to perform a book written about acts that occurred on foreign soil then please take the time to pronounce the names of people, places and descriptions properly. Noah’s pronunciation of German, French and Italian words is distracting at best and just down right painful at worst. A small example of a word used many times is “Wehrmacht “. Noah constantly pronounces it “Wehr maakt “ with a hard W and not “vehr maakt” with a V.

Learn and practice words in other languages before talking a book full of them please!!

Unique Look

Where does Donovan's Devils rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

Good. The author or narrator might have chosen to avoid reading glossary/appendix type opens that readers typically skipped over.

What other book might you compare Donovan's Devils to and why?

Like many works on the OSS it offers a solid overview but this is one of the few works to focus on the Operational Groups.