The most recommended sniper books

There are many books, some greatly fictionalized, claiming just who was the most effective USMC sniper in Vietnam.  Although extremely brief, this book confirms just who was the top Marine sniper in the Vietnam War.  Mawhinney had 103 kills.  Unlike other snipers who have embellished their accomplishments, Mawhinney has remained modest and off the grid.  He alone sits at the top of the list of "Marine snipers with the most kills."

Titled after the cost of a single sniper round, this book details the performance and accomplishment of scout snipers in the 5th Marine Regiment. Culberson and his fellow Marine snipers exhibited patience, stealth, marksmanship, and pure courage to make their sniper platoon the most decorated in the Corps. Uncommon valor was a common virtue among these one-shot killers.

This riveting novel brings us into the lives of Russian snipers during the WW II siege of Stalingrad.

We live in a basement, learn something of extreme patience, and get a sense of how people barely remain sane in pressure-cooker situations. What struck me most were the women. One was a sniper with extreme convictions. Others were there for the pleasure of the men. But the best part of the novel was the cat-and-mouse game between opposing snipers. 

Not only did I learn something about warfare, but I couldn’t put the book down.

In case you thought a male author wouldn’t be included on this list, I raise you Taylor Adams, whose entire backlist is worth reading. (That scariest book I referred to in my list? Another of his). This one is described as “the most gripping suspense thriller you will ever read,” and as overblown as that sounds, I have to agree. Elle and James Eversman—whose surname is apt—break down on a lonesome stretch of desert rubble, led there by a highway detour. What follows underneath the broiling desert sun is an encounter with one sick and highly skilled antagonist. That this every-couple proves equal to outmaneuvering him, mostly by power of their wits, although with a few badass moves as well, makes for one of the most stunning showdowns ever seen on the page—one in which you’ll be cheering every inch of Elle’s crawl toward victory.

This is the first person narrative of Kulger’s two years as a scout sniper with the 4th Marine Regiment. Relates what it is like to look through the scope, pull the trigger, and watch your target die. Kulger’s experiences mirror that of most Marine snipers in the war. This is the reality of being a scout sniper, not the fiction that is often written about the elite Marine shooters.

Books that tell the story of Special Operations soldiers fighting in the Global War on Terror typically focus all of their efforts on adrenaline, explosions, the men, and the teams. While those are all critical elements and essential to the stories, most of them leave out one of the most crucial factors to keeping Special Operations troops in the fight.

In Special Forces, we had many sayings, but one of the most important was, “if momma ain’t happy, Joe ain’t happy.” 

All active duty soldiers engaged in war, even we Special Operators, depend on our families to keep us going. These may be the details required to keep the household running, keeping the family happy, healthy & fed (as nearly all Special Operators are extremely family-oriented), but also to be the rocks that we can fall back on when needed, the support to keep us pushing forward, and… show more.

I love history, and The Diamond Eye is a fantastic retelling of Soviet sniper Lyudmila Pavlichenko’s story. Quinn’s research into Pavlichenko’s life is evident as she seamlessly weaves details about the deadliest female sniper ever into a thrilling narrative that encompasses a plot to assassinate American President Roosevelt.

Who doesn’t like a good underdog story? When we first meet Pavlichenko, she is a young, single mother with a small child working a factory job. Through sheer tenacity and hard work, she enrolls in Kiev University to get her degree, and the war breaks out. She then embarks on her remarkable military career that propels her onto the international stage and to an officer’s rank (all the while carrying her cherished university thesis).

This is the best story about someone you’ve never heard of before.

Contains the history, along with exceptional pictures and illustrations, of Army and Marine snipers in Vietnam. Along with history it details the fielding of rifles, scopes, and suppression devices. More technical than “war story” it provides an excellent base document on which to build an education on long range shooting by American soldiers and Marines in the Vietnam War.

Ethnic and religious conflicts pitted Orthodox Serbians, Catholic Croatians, and Muslim Bosnians against each other and sparked the siege of Sarajevo. Set in the 1990s during the war, The Cellist of Sarajevo plunges the reader into the perspectives of three characters trying to survive ineffable violence in a city crippled by fear. A shell kills twenty-two civilians standing in a bread line. A cellist risks his life to sit in the crater forged by the mortar and play Albinoni’s Adagio once a day for twenty-two days. This novel demonstrates how dehumanization is used as a means to justify killing those on opposing sides. I visited the region a few years ago, and during a drive across Bosnia to visit Međugorje, a sense of deep sadness struck. The fallout of the war remains visible—weariness etched in people’s faces, bullet-riddled apartment blocks. But the sadness did make some room for hope. During… show more.

As an avid reader and digester of Dennis Palumbo’s outstanding thriller series, I eagerly dived into his latest book, Panic Attack. 

Rinaldi expertly uses his skills as a psychologist with a “tough on the outside, warm heart on the inside” personality to extricate himself from the dangerous situations he is drawn to as an advocate for compassionate justice and the innocent.

In Panic Attack, Rinaldi witnesses a college mascot shot by a sniper at a football game and gets drawn into another murder mystery when the intended victim calls the psychologist to help him deal with his panic. Soon, Rinaldi has been drafted to investigate a killing spree in which a serial murderer could be targeting him.

Palumbo, as in his other Rinaldi books, weaves a gripping, exciting thriller with fascinating characters and always surprising plot twists set in a wonderfully created atmosphere of Pittsburgh noir. I’ve enjoyed… show more.