William R. Forstchen

Dr. William R. Forstchen is the author or co-author of six Wing Commander novels.

Bibliography

Novels

Ice Prophet

• Ice Prophet (1983)
• The Flame Upon the Ice (1984)
• A Darkness Upon the Ice (1985)

Into the Sea of Stars (1986)

The Gamester Wars

• The Alexandrian Ring (1987)
• The Assassin Gambit (1988)
• The Napoleon Wager (1993)

The Crystal Warriors

• The Crystal Warriors (1988) with Greg Morrison
• The Crystal Sorcerers (1991) with Greg Morrison

The Lost Regiment

• Rally Cry (1990)
• Union Forever (1991)
• Terrible Swift Sword (1992)
• Fateful Lightning (1993)
• Battle Hymn (1997)
• Never Sound Retreat (1998)
• A Band of Brothers (1999)
• Men of War (1999)
• Down to the Sea (2000)

Wing Commander

• End Run (1994) with Christopher Stasheff
• Fleet Action (1994)
• Heart of the Tiger (1995) with Andrew Keith
• The Price of Freedom (1996) with Ben Ohlander
• Action Stations (1998)
• False Colors (1999) with Andrew Keith

Magic: The Gathering (1994)

• Arena (1994)

Star Voyager

• Star Voyager Academy (1994)
• Article 23 (1998)
• Prometheus (1999)

1945 (1995) with Newt Gingrich

The Four Magics (1996) with Larry Segriff

Star Trek: The Next Generation

• #57 - The Forgotten War (1999)

Shattered Light

• #3 - Catseye (1999) with Jaki Demarest

Legends of the Riftwar

• Book 1 - Honoured Enemy (2001) with Raymond E. Feist

Gettysburg

• Gettysburg (2003) with Newt Gingrich
• Grant Comes East (2004) with Newt Gingrich
• Never Call Retreat: Lee and Grant, the Final Victory (2005) with Newt Gingrich

Pacific War

• Pearl Harbor: A Novel of December 8th (2007) with Newt Gingrich
• Days of Infamy (2008) with Newt Gingrich

One Second After

• One Second After (2009)
• One Year After (2015)
• The Final Day (2017)
• Five Years After (2023)

George Washington

• To Try Men’s Souls: A Novel of George Washington and the Fight for American Freedom (2009) with Newt Gingrich
• Valley Forge (2011) with Newt Gingrich
• Victory at Yorktown (2012) with Newt Gingrich

The Battle of the Crater: a Novel of the Civil War (2011) with Newt Gingrich

Pillar to the Sky (2014)

48 Hours (2019)

Novellas

Day of Wrath (2014)

Twin Flame (2017) with Nora D'Ecclesis

Short Stories

• "The Wings of the Falcon" in Boys' Life (September 1978)

• "Jamboree in Space" in Boys' Life (June 1985)

• "By Thought Alone" in There Will Be War Volume VI: Guns of Darkness (ed. Jerry Pournelle) (1987)

• "The Truthsayer" in Arabesques: More Tales of the Arabian Nights (ed. Susan Shwartz) (1988)

• "Space Dive!" in Boys' Life (February 1990)

• "Running from the Sun" in Boys' Life (November 1991)

• "Diving with Dolphins" in Boys' Life (April 1994)

• "Fog of War" in Dragon's Eye (ed. Christopher Stasheff) (1994)

• "Endings" in Bolos Book 2: The Unconquerable (ed. Keith Laumer) (1994)

• "Rescue on Mars" in Boys' Life (February 1995)

• "Jacus the Slug" in The Day the Magic Stopped (ed. Christopher Stasheff) (1995) with John Mina

• "Catch the Wind" in Boys' Life (April 1996)

• "Would You?" in Don't Forget Your Spacesuit, Dear (ed. Jody Lynn Nye) (1996)

• "Yesterday's Gods" in Bolos Book 4: Last Stand (ed. Keith Laumer) (1997) with John Mina

• "A Hard Day for Mother" in Alternate Generals (ed. Harry Turtledove) (1998)

• "Jamboree 3000" in Boys' Life (January 2000)

Essays and Articles

• "Locked Up in Another World" in Boys' Life (April 1989)

• "Civil War Scouts" in Boys' Life (October 1996)

• "Greek Mercenaries in Persia - The Anabasis, 400 B.C." in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "Hannibal in Italy - The Battle of Lake Trasimene, 217 B.C." in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "The Fine Art of Contract Negotiation - The White Company and the Battle of Florence, 1364" in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "The Game of Survival - Sir John de Hawkwood at Borgoforto, 1367" in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "Mercenaries Triumphant - The Battle of Castagnaro, 1387" in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "he Hessians in America - The Battle of Trenton, 1776" in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "Faithful Unto Death - The Massacre of the Swiss Guards, 1792" in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "Death With Honor - The Battle of Camerone, 1863" in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "The Lost Cause - Dien Bien Phu, 1953" in Mercs: True Stories of Mercenaries in Action (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "A Historical Event" in Making Contact: A Serious Handbook for Locating and Communicating With Extraterrestrials (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "First Contact" in Making Contact: A Serious Handbook for Locating and Communicating With Extraterrestrials (ed. Bill Fawcett) (1997)

• "Yes, the front-line combat soldier reached the limits of his endurance in World War II; he was denied the periods of rest experienced by soldiers in earlier wars, and he had to cope with the severe psychological demands of modern warfare— demands that most soldiers could endure for only about six months." in History in Dispute, Volume 4: World War II - 1939-1943 (ed. Dennis Showalter) (1999)

• "Yes, the U.S. armed forces were justified in concentrating on the destruction of fascism over racism, because fascism was a far more insidious evil that threatened the extermination of a race." in History in Dispute, Volume 4: World War II - 1939-1943 (ed. Dennis Showalter) (1999)

• "Yes, the Allies should have bombed the death camps and more aggressively opposed the Holocaust in order to save lives and send a message of condemnation to the Nazis." in History in Dispute, Volume 5: World War II - 1943-1945 (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2000)

• "If British prime minister Winston Churchill had prevailed in his Balkan strategy the Western Allies would have wasted valuable resources and alienated the Soviet Union." in History in Dispute, Volume 5: World War II - 1943-1945 (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2000)

• "Atrocities on a massive scale during World War II were perpetrated by several warring nations as a matter of state policy." in History in Dispute, Volume 5: World War II - 1943-1945 (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2000)

• "Yes, the enormity of Nazi crimes demanded a public trial where those responsible were formally accused and their guilt established." in History in Dispute, Volume 5: World War II - 1943-1945 (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2000)

• "No, resources given to the island-hopping campaign could have been better spent supporting the U.S. Army's advance through the Philippines, the D-Day invasion of Normandy, and a submarine blockade of Japan." in History in Dispute, Volume 5: World War II - 1943-1945 (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2000)

• "No. The antiwar movement undercut the government position on the Vietnam War and helped the North Vietnamese win the conflict." in History in Dispute, Volume 6: The Cold War - Second Series (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2000)

• "Yes. The Soviets pursued an aggressive foreign policy in the Middle East that not only helped destabilize the region but compromised the U.S.S.R. as well." in History in Dispute, Volume 6: The Cold War - Second Series (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2000)

• "Yes. Joseph Stalin needed the Cold War in order to justify repression in the U.S.S.R. and Soviet control of Eastern Europe." in History in Dispute, Volume 6: The Cold War - Second Series (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2000)

• "The Realities of an Alternate Pearl Harbor" in A Date Which Will Live in Infamy: An Anthology of Pearl Harbor Stories That Might Have Been (ed. Brian M. Thomson and Martin H. Greenberg) (2001)

• "Yes. The blood lust exhibited by frontline soldiers throughout the conflict stopped only with the collapse of the German war effort." in History in Dispute, Volume 8: World War I - First Series (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2002)

• "Yes. Between 1871 and 1914 European armies moved toward an intellectualized concept of the offensive as a sovereign recipe for victory, without regard for the objective analyses of developments in technology and administration that predicted a prolonged war." in History in Dispute, Volume 8: World War I - First Series (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2002)

• "Yes. The half-dozen divisions of the BEF were no more than a flank guard in northern France. Deployed through Antwerp, or even directed against the German Baltic coastline, they could have had a much greater effect." in History in Dispute, Volume 9: World War I - Second Series (ed. Dennis Showalter) (2002)

• "Lee's Victory at Gettysburg... And Then What?" in Alternate Gettysburgs (ed. Brian M. Thomson and Martin H. Greenberg) (2002)

• "Going Back to Gettysburg" in Boys' Life (July 2003)

• "Return to Normandy" in Boys' Life (June 2004) with W.E. Butterworth IV

• "The Eye of God" in Beyond Shock and Awe: Warfare in the 21st Century (ed. Eric L. Haney adn Briam M. Thomsen) (2007)

• "What Would He Say to Us Today?" for Newsmax.com (February 9, 2009) with Newt Gingrich

• "With the Union at Gettysburg" in Men at War: A Soldier's Eye View of the Most Important Battles in HIstory (ed. Bill Fawcett) (2009)

• Introduction in If the Allies Had Fallen: Sixty Alternate Scenarios of World War II (ed. Dennis Showalter and Harold Deutsch) (2012)

• "Memorials to our fallen should never be closed" in CNN (October 11, 2013)

• "Why does Bernie Sanders want to quash Elon Musk’s dreams?" in The Hill (April 13, 2021)

• "Why Do We Censor the Dead?" in American Spectator (November 15, 2023)

Nonfiction

It Seemed Like a Good Idea...: A Compendium of Great Historical Fiascoes (2000) with Bill Fawcett

Hot Shots: America's First Jet Aces (2000) with Jennie Ethell Chancey

We Look Like Men of War (2001)

Honor Untarnished: A West Point Graduate's Memoir of World War II (2003) with Donald V. Bennett

Academic Papers

The 28th United States Colored Troops: Indiana’s African-Americans Go to War, 1863-1865 (1994)

Boys' Life Stories

Dr. Forstchen's first published story was "The Wings of the Falcon" which was printed in the September 1978 issue of Boys' Life. He continued to write both short stories and articles for the magazine into the 21st century.

The Wings of the Falcon

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Jamboree in Space

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Locked Up in Another World

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Space Dive!

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Running from the Sun

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Diving with Dolphins

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Rescue on Mars

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Catch the Wind

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Civil War Scouts

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Jamboree 3000

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Going Back to Gettysburg

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Return to Normandy

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