English Edition (Paperback)

Shock Troops

Canadians Fighting The Great War 1917-1918, Volume Two

  • Language:
    Publisher:
  • English
    Penguin Canada
About Shock Troops:

Shock Troops follows the Canadian fighting forces during the titanic battles of Vimy Ridge, Hill 70, Passchendaele, and the Hundred Days campaign.

Through the eyes of the soldiers who fought and died in the trenches on the Western Front, and based on newly uncovered Canadian, British, and German archival sources, Cook builds on Volume I of his national bestseller, At the Sharp End. The Canadian fighting forces never lost a battle during the final 2 years of the war, and although they paid a terrible price in the killing fields of the Great War, they were indeed, as British Prime Minister David Lloyd George exclaimed, the shock troops of the Empire.

Awards, Nominations, and Distinctions:

Winner – RBC Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction

Finalist – J.W. Dafoe Book Prize

About the Author(s):

TIM COOK was Chief Historian and Director of Research at the Canadian War Museum for twenty-three years. His bestselling books have won multiple awards, including four Ottawa Book Awards for Literary Non-Fiction and two C.P. Stacey Awards for the best book in Canadian military history. In 2008 he won the J.W. Dafoe Prize for At the Sharp End and again in 2018 for Vimy: The Battle and the Legend. Shock Troops won the 2009 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction. His most recent book, Lifesavers and Body Snatchers, won the 2023 Ottawa Book Award and was shortlisted for the 2022 Templer Medal for Best Book. Cook was a frequent commentator in the media, and a member of the Royal Society of Canada and the Order of Canada.

Other Editions:

  • English (Hardcover)

Other Books by Tim Cook:

  • At the Sharp End

  • Fight to the Finish

  • Lifesavers and Body Snatchers

  • The Good Allies

  • The Madman and the Butcher

  • The Necessary War

  • The Secret History of Soldiers

  • The Unquiet Western Front

  • Vimy

  • Warlords