About John C. McManus

John C. McManus was born and raised in St. Louis.  He attended the University of Missouri and earned a degree in sports journalism.  After a brief stint in advertising and sports broadcasting, he embarked on a literary and academic career.  He earned an M.A. in American history from the University of Missouri in 1991 and a Ph.D in American history and military history from the University of Tennessee in 1996.  He participated in the University of Tennessee’s Normandy Scholars program and, in the process, had an opportunity to study the battle first hand at the Normandy battlefields.  At Tennessee he served as Assistant Director of the Center for the Study of War and Society, where he helped oversee a major effort to collect the first hand stories of American veterans of World War II.  Making extensive use of this material, as well as sources from many other archives, he published two well received books, The Deadly Brotherhood: The American Combat Soldier in World War II in 1998, and Deadly Sky: The American Combat Airman in World War II in 2000.  Shortly after the publication of Deadly Sky he accepted a position as Assistant Professor of U.S. Military History at the University of Missouri-Rolla where he now teaches courses on the Civil War, World War II, Vietnam, Military History, and the American Combat Experience in the 20th Century. 

A frequent contributor to World War II magazine and a member of the magazine’s editorial advisory board, in 2004 he published a two volume series on the American role in the Battle of Normandy.  The first book, The Americans at D-Day: The American Experience at the Normandy Invasion was released in June 2004.  The second book, The Americans at Normandy: The Summer of 1944, the American War from the Beaches to Falaise was published in November 2004. 

In 2007-2008 he will publish four new books.  Alamo in the Ardennes: The Untold Story of the American Soldiers who made the Defense of Bastogne Possible (John Wiley and Sons, March 2007) is a fast paced, graphic history of the desperate race for the key town of Bastogne in the early days of the Battle of the Bulge.  His next book, The 7th Infantry: Combat in an Age of Terror, Korea through the Present, (TOR-Forge, May 2008) is the first of two gritty volumes covering the history of one of the U.S. Army’s most distinguished combat outfits.  The second volume on the earlier part of the regiment’s history, American Courage, American Carnage: The 7th Infantry Regiment and the Story of America’s Combat Experience, 1812 through World War II (TOR-Forge) will be published in 2008.  In the fall of 2007, McManus will publish U.S. Military History for Dummies, (John Wiley and Sons), a lively, down-to-earth overview of the American military experience.  In another forthcoming book Grunts: The American Infantry Combat Experience, World War II through the Present, (NAL/Penguin), he will examine the realities of modern combat like never before.

Currently, McManus lives in St. Louis with his wife Nancy.  An amateur hockey player, he has an abiding passion for sports, especially Cardinal baseball, Rams football and Blues hockey.

Deadly Brotherhood: The American Combat Soldier in World War II, Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1998, (hardcover), ISBN 0-89141-655-2

Deadly Brotherhood: The American Combat Soldier in World War II, Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 2000, (trade paperback), ISBN 0-89141-721-4

Deadly Brotherhood: The American Combat Soldier in World War II, New York: Presidio, Ballantine, 2003, (mass market paperback), ISBN 0-89141-823-7

Deadly Sky: The American Combat Airman in World War II, Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 2000, (hardcover), ISBN 0-89141-678-1

Deadly Sky: The American Combat Airman in World War II, Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 2002,

(trade paperback), ISBN 0-89-141-779-6

The Americans at D-Day: The American Experience at the Normandy Invasion, New York: TOR-Forge, 2004, (hardcover), ISBN 0-765-30743-X

The Americans at Normandy: The Summer of 1944, the American War from the Beaches to Falaise, New York: TOR-Forge, 2004 (hardcover), ISBN 0-765-31199-2

The Americans at D-Day, New York: TOR-Forge, 2005, (trade paperback), ISBN 0-765-30744-8

The Americans at Normandy, New York: TOR-Forge, 2005, (trade paperback), ISBN 0-765-31200-X