The Mosquito Bowl: A Game of Life and Death in World War II

by Buzz Bissinger

Instant New York Times Bestseller - Winner of the General Wallace M. Greene Jr. Award from the Marine Corps Heritage Foundation

"Buzz Bissinger's Friday Night Lights is an American classic. With The Mosquito Bowl, he is back with a true story even more colorful and profound. This book too is destined to become a classic. I devoured it." -- John Grisham

An extraordinary, untold story of the Second World War in the vein of Unbroken and The Boys in the Boat, from the author of Friday Night Lights and Three Nights in August.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, college football was at the height of its popularity. As the nation geared up for total war, one branch of the service dominated the aspirations of college football the United States Marine Corps. Which is why, on Christmas Eve of 1944, when the 4th and 29th Marine regiments found themselves in the middle of the Pacific Ocean training for what would be the bloodiest battle of the war - the invasion of Okinawa--their ranks included one of the greatest pools of football talent ever Former All Americans, captains from Wisconsin and Brown and Notre Dame, and nearly twenty men who were either drafted or would ultimately play in the NFL.

When the trash-talking between the 4th and 29th over who had the better football team reached a fever pitch, it was The two regiments would play each other in a football game as close to the real thing as you could get in the dirt and coral of Guadalcanal. The bruising and bloody game that followed became known as "The Mosquito Bowl."

Within a matter of months, 15 of the 65 players in "The Mosquito Bowl" would be killed at Okinawa, by far the largest number of American athletes ever to die in a single battle. The Mosquito Bowl is the story of these brave and beautiful young men, those who survived and those who did not. It is the story of the families and the landscape that shaped them. It is a story of a far more innocent time in both college athletics and the life of the country, and of the loss of that innocence.

Writing with the style and rigor that won him a Pulitzer Prize and have made several of his books modern classics, Buzz Bissinger takes us from the playing fields of America's campuses where boys played at being Marines, to the final time they were allowed to still be boys on that field of dirt and coral, to the darkest and deadliest days that followed at Okinawa.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Sports, World War II, War, Military Fiction, Football

479 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 13, 2022

About the author

See also H.G. Bissinger

Reviews

[John Devlin · Rating 2 out of 5]

“There still is far too much misogyny and racism and hatred of the Other in the United States for any generation to be great”

No, this is false. There is no institutional, structural racism in America today. Anyone can achieve their life’s ambition regardless of race, creed or sex through hard works and luck…or just luck

The only conclusion to draw from this book is that Bissinger with his history of a successful football book, is playing off this to sell this book.

There’s almost nothing of the actual vaunted mosquito bowl, here. The event is an excuse to deliver some prose and some encyclopedic like entries of young men who died at Okinawa.

[Mac · Rating 3 out of 5]

Having enjoyed Buzz Bissinger’s Friday Night Lights, I eagerly read his latest, The Mosquito Bowl, and I found both books featured the author’s clever topic selection, thorough research, and easy-to-read writing style. However, even though The Mosquito Bowl covers a more significant topic in American history (WWII compared to high school football), I found Friday Night Lights more interesting and compelling.

On the positive side, The Mosquito Bowl left me with a range of emotions and thoughts—sadness at the loss of life for so many who were so young…the brutality of war, specifically the horrors of the Okinawa invasion…the sacrifices of The Greatest Generation (though Bissinger makes clear there also were slackers, cowards, and selfish Americans back then)…the intense, and counter-productive, competition among the US armed services…and the physical prowess of the soldiers, particularly those who participated in the football game—the Mosquito Bowl on Christmas Eve, 1944, in the middle of the Pacific.

But somehow the latter book didn’t work for me. Bissinger devotes only a few paragraphs to the football game itself, saying, “Many of the details have been lost after nearly 80 years.” That’s a strange admission given the book's title, and it’s a glaring contrast to the rest of the book where most events are described in precise detail. Also, using the game as a frame to hold the entire narrative together is a stretch. Though the football game provides the reader with a reference point as the war unfolds and though it also humanizes the various characters, the game at times feels irrelevant to the larger war story Bissinger is telling. The game feels peripheral, a forced device imposed on the narrative.

So I found a contradiction in reading The Mosquito Bowl. By the end, I was heartbroken at the loss of life and the ruined futures of soldiers and their families. What’s more, I felt I have lived a selfish life compared to the selflessness and sacrifice of so many during the war. Though I was moved by the book, I didn’t find it an enjoyable or well-crafted read.

[Therese · Rating 4 out of 5]

A telling of WWll in the Pacific theater, focusing on the young men who were star college football players back home, who, in the middle of the war, were able to get together to play one hell of a football game that they called The Mosquito Bowl, and then tracked what happened to them as the war came to a close. Some made it. Many didn’t. Not being a history buff, I learned some interesting and horrific things about that part of the war. Reading some of the details, it was truly a miracle that my uncle made it back home alive. In his old age, he finally recounted some of his experiences, and declared that he wasn’t a hero, but rather it was the young men who fought and paid the ultimate price who best deserved that title.

[Sara · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I did enjoy this book and following the various people throughout their war service, I have to give it a solid ding for the title event only being one page. I’m not sure what the title should’ve been, but I do know I would’ve read it anyway without the bait and switch.

[Kevin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a strange book. I read it to find out more about the Mosquito Bowl which was a football game played on Christmas Eve, 1944 by the members of the US military fighting in Guadalcanal. Unfortunately the author did not cover the game. Instead he gave histories of several of the players lives and then their fates during the arduous battle of Okinawa. Many of the players were killed or wounded.

While reading the book the author discloses some decidedly anti-American sentiments which detracted from the narrative for me. He admits to it in the epilogue but also confesses to an admiration of the people who were involved.

[Steven Z. · Rating 5 out of 5]

The contributions of American athletes to the war effort during World War II has been well documented. The experiences of Ted Williams, Bob Feller, Hank Greenberg, Tom Landry, Ed Lummus and hundreds of others have been recognized for their impact in defeating Germany and Japan. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Buzz Bissinger’s latest book, THE MOSQUITO BOWL: A GAME OF LIFE AND DEATH IN WORLD WAR II chronicles events leading up to a game between the 4th and 29th Marine Regiments on Guadalcanal in late 1944 and the fate of many who fought at Tarawa, Saipan, and Okinawa. The soldiers were made up of former All-Americans from Brown, Notre Dame and Wisconsin universities twenty of which were drafted by the National Football League. Of the sixty-five men who played in the game, fifteen would die a few months later at Okinawa.

Bissinger, the author of FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS, a story of high school football in Texas brings to life the men and their military training as they prepared for the Marine assault on Okinawa. During their preparations trash talking between the two Marine Regiments reached a fever pitch which led to what has been referred to as “the Mosquito Bowl.” Bissinger’s narrative explores the lives of these men with insight, empathy, and a clear picture of what they were experiencing and would soon be up against. It is a well told story of college athletes and their loss of innocence. It begins on the playing fields of America’s colleges through their final time f to remain boys to the darkest days that would follow on Okinawa.

The book is a dichotomy in the story it tells. First and foremost, Bissinger zeroes in on the lives of a number of individuals who developed as exceptional athletes and morphed into American Marines. Bissinger focuses on the lives of John Marshall McLaughey, Captain of the Brown football team, played one year with the New York Giants and enlisted immediately after Pearl Harbor. Another major football star, this time as an All-American at the University of Wisconsin, David Schreiner enlisted as an officer candidate with the Marines. Tony Butkovich, from a family of eleven, one of which was a fighter pilot, was an All-American at the University of Illinois, later at Purdue University and was drafted number one by the Cleveland Rams. Butkovich would not make the grade as a Marine officer and became a corporal in the infantry. Bob Bauman was Butkovich’s teammate at Wisconsin and his brother Frank played at Illinois, both brothers joined the Marines. Bob McGowan, from western Pennsylvania was a Sergeant and Squad leader who was severely wounded on Okinawa and whose story provides the reader with the feel of the terror and bloodshed of battle. Lastly, George Murphy, Captain of the Notre Dame football team would join the others as Marines, in his case as an officer candidate.

The book jacket describing Bissinger’s narrative is a bit misleading. It appears the book will concentrate on football, but its treatment goes much deeper in its exploration of a number of important topics in American history during the first half of the 20th century. Bissinger follows the military training that the athletes experienced, but its focus is diverse. The depression plays a prominent role in the upbringing of the Bauman brothers in a small town just south of Chicago. The issue of immigration stands out because of its impact on the diversity of American society, but also the backlash that was created after World War I when families like the Butkovichs came to the United States from Croatia at the turn of the century. By 1924, Congress passed the Johnson Act designed to block immigration from southern and eastern Europe. The legislation reflected politics combined with the pseudo-science of eugenics which became very popular in the post-World War I period that argued certain groups were inferior to “white Americans.” Daniel Okrent’s THE GUARDED GATE: BIGOTRY, EUGENICS AND THE LAW THAT KEPT TWO GENERATIONS OF JEWS, ITALIANS, AND OTHER EUROPEAN IMMIGRANTS OUT OF AMERICA is an exceptional study of American racism during that period.

Racism is a dominant theme apart from war and athletics as Bissinger explores how blacks were treated in the military. Lynchings and murders were common in the American south and the experiences of blacks in the military revolved around demeaning jobs mostly in supply, laundries, bakeries, sanitation, ammo dumps leading to the conclusion that the United States fought for freedom in occupied Europe and the Pacific, but there would be no freedom for the 13 million Blacks living in the United States of America. At the outset of the war there were no blacks in the Marines.

The military leadership used college football stars as a recruiting tool and stressed the similar values and talents that college football and the military held in common. Exemptions for college athletes from the draft led to anger by the families of those fighting in Europe and the Pacific while many the same age enjoyed the life of a star athlete. Bissinger does an exceptional job delving into the West Point football program as they experienced their best seasons in 1944 and 1945 due to the accomplishments of exempted players “Doc” Blanchard and Glenn Davis, who were better known as “Mr. inside, and Mr. Outside.” Their exploits would lead the Army to national championships.

Bissinger has total command of the history of the war and college athletics. The author lists more than 100 pages of endnotes, assembled from military records, correspondence, interviews of survivors and other reportorial feats — shows up everywhere, in the numbers, in battle accounts, in the homey mundanity of letters, and a clear incisive writing style, sprinkled with humor and sarcasm which are keys to the book’s success. As to the conduct of the war, Bissinger pulls no punches as he recounts the errors in judgement by military higher ups as it planned and carried out the amphibious landing at Tarawa which turned into a bloody disaster with 2000 casualties in the first 76 hours of the invasion. The key to victory over Japan would be “island hopping” therefore amphibious warfare was of the utmost importance, but military strategists did not make use of all of its assets, i.e.; LVT boats as opposed to Higgins boats that could not navigate through the coral that surrounded many Pacific islands. Bissinger’s discussions of Tarawa and the outright stupidity of General Simon Bolivar Buckner, Jr. who commanded US forces at Okinawa can only anger the reader as it resulted in the useless deaths of so many young men.

Another important weapon Bissinger explores is that of the “flame thrower.” On Okinawa and other islands, the Japanese benefited from their use of caves with interlocking tunnels, a difficult problem to overcome. The caves were challenging to penetrate by bombing so the use of napalm from flame throwers became imperative. Despite the application of this weapon which saved many American lives, the Japanese inflicted innumerable casualties on the Americans as they fought from hill to hill. Japanese troop strength on Okinawa was much higher than US intelligence pointed out, roughly 100,000, not the 66,000 that was estimated. Bissinger lays out the fears and hopes of the men as they prepared and carried out their mission with horrendous results. In the end over 250,000 people died in 82 days at Okinawa. Of that number 50,000 were American, 20,000 Marines, 8222 from the 6th Division. In the last quarter of the book Bissinger does justice to their memory as he lays out the battle for Okinawa, the Japanese who fought to the death, and the obstacles that the Marines had to overcome. He lays out the story of all the men who fought at Okinawa and played in the Mosquito Bowl along with countless others.

The core of the book revolves around The Mosquito Bowl, which was a spirited, semi-organized football game on Guadalcanal. The game, played on Christmas Eve 1944 with at least 1,500 Marines watching, is both a pretext and an organizing principle for the book, but its significance fades as Bissinger explores the fates of several participants. Combat and other dirty aspects of warfare are ever present. The fighting on Tarawa, Saipan, Okinawa and stories of those who never returned home point to the insanity of war, which regrettably still dominates our news cycle today as we witness Russian terrorism and atrocities in Ukraine. The title of the book is a misnomer as there is little discussion of the game itself – more to the point the book is not about a football game but the tragedy of young men fighting and dying in wars far from home.

[Bruce Sembar · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books I have read in a long time. Maybe because my father was a WWII veteran and he rarely spoke about his experiences just saying, we did what had to be done. The actual football game was a side note that tied together the characters the author brought to life. Even though you knew the main characters were going to be among the 15 athletes/marines that were going to die, it was still sad to imagine that they were all young men with their whole lives in front of them that never got to live those lives. I can't wait for this book to come out in September, I will buy it because I want to see the pictures that will be included.

[Porter Broyles · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't know what I expected from this book. But it sounded like it could be a fun detour down a minor path of forgotten history.

It wasn't that bad, but it didn't really capture my attention.

The most interesting tidbit that I picked up was that during WWII, most officers were 90-day wonders. If you enlisted or were drafted into service and showed promise to be an officer, you were rushed through training in 90 days.

If you attended on of the service academies, you training period was 3 years. So if you were accepted to one of the academies, you received a 3 year draft deferment. This created a heirachy in the service that lasted at least through my dad's retirement in 1993.

Surprisingly those who went to the academy were considered by the rest of the service as draft dodgers!

But this created an interesting side story. Army claims 3 collegiate football championships--1944-46.

Bissinger points to the fact that during the war, college football programs had no consistency. They never knew who their starters were going to be from week to week because somebody might get drafted or called up. Army, however, had consistency not just from game to game, but year to year. This allowed Army to absolutely dominate college athletics during the war and for a few years afterwards.

[skip thurnauer · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Mosquito Bowl tells the story of a football game played on Okinawa by some of the best football players in America, all serving their country as Marines in WWII. Like Bissinger's Friday Night Lights, the real stories are the stories of the men who played the game, young men like John McLaughry, an all-star at Brown who played for the NY Giants. The University of Wisconsin's David Schreiner was one of the greatest college ends in a decade and was drafted by the Detroit Lions. Frank and Bob Butkovich led their Canton, Illinois teams to championships in football, basketball, and baseball. Frank, a fullback, was an All-American and a first round draft choice by the Cleveland Rams. The reader learns about these men and others, not only their athletic achievements, but also about their families and their communities. The Mosquito Bowl was played by 56 men who had played college football, 22 of whom were starters, sixteen had been drafted by the pros or received offers, 5 had been team captains, and 3 were all Americans. The game is almost a postscript, told in just a few pages. The gory battles of Okinawa detail the staunch defense of the Japanese army, dug into mountainsides and caves against the U.S. Marines, Army, and Navy who fought in the steamy heat, muck, jungle in the South Pacific. The heroics of our military resulted in victory, achieved at an enormous cost. In 82 days, as many as 250,000 people were killed . The total number of U.S. casualties was roughly 50,000, including many of the men the reader has come to know as football players and Marines. In the Epilogue Bissinger writes, "When I think about the men of the Mosquito Bowl who died, there is one image I can't get out of my mind: how they were alive, living and breathing... and were gone, just like that... The word that keeps coming back to me is waste, the absolute waste of those men's lives regardless of their unfathomable bravery and sacrifice that preserved our freedoms." Because the reader has become invested in these young men, that feeling is unavoidable and permeable. The Mosquito Bowl is a sports story, a military story, and a story of mid-twentieth century America.

[Nancy Shaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, boy. This is a tough one. Did I like it or not? I wanted to.
So much history of World War II. Intense history with so many details of preparation and actual ground warfare of particularly the Marines in preparation of the invasion of Okinawa. Gory details. Brutal details Off the invasion itself. That part was hard, but brought the battles to life in vivid descriptions and scenes like no other book I’ve read. Horrible, the useless waste of life of so many young men.
While Bissinger’s style of writing is often over the top in details, as when he lists the names of the men killed in action alphabetically to the count of sometimes more than fifty, he makes the reader actually feel the numbers and realize each is a person. He uses this writing technique over and over. Listing the names and methods of kill rather than just saying, “sixty-five men were killed” is annoying but effective.
And the Mosquito Bowl? Hardly talked about. A football game the marines cooked up since there were so many many young football players who had been drafted, professional and other. Makes one wonder why he made this game the title of the book

I will remember this book for a long while and perhaps that is why I gave it a four as I don’t usually like historical war stories.

[Grace Roth · Rating 4 out of 5]

While the story is an interesting one, the author spent about a page and a half talking about the title event. He built it up so much that it was a little bit of a let down when it actually happened. Additionally there were far too many tangents on various aspects of the social and political climate of the time that had little to do with the actual men who played in the Mosquito Bowl. It seemed as though the author thought at times he was writing a book about racism in WWII rather than a football game. I am not saying those issues didn't exist, but the story he is writing is not about racism. It's about football and the men who played it and then sacrificed it all to fight for our country.

That being said, the last half of the book following each member of the teams who played and their fates was beautifully written in heartbreaking and heartbreaking detail, showing in rich detail the unimaginable horrors of war.

Overall, there is a lot about the author's writing that is well done and spun the story well. He could have just cut out some of the social and political commentary that did not relate to the story of the members of the Marines who played in the Mosquito Bowl

[Bookreporter.com Biography & Memoir · Rating 5 out of 5]

As I was preparing to read and review THE MOSQUITO BOWL, I researched Buzz Bissinger’s body of work. I thought I was familiar with his writing as the author of well-known sports books during a four-decade career. Football fans recognize FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS as a sports classic. Almost every football coach I know has read Bissinger’s account of high school football in Permian, Texas. Ranked by Sports Illustrated as the fourth best sports book ever written, it served as the basis for a movie and a television series that even today has passionate followers.

However, I learned that there is more to Bissinger than writing about sports. Awarded the Pulitzer Prize for pieces he wrote on Philadelphia courtroom corruption, Bissinger has covered figures as varied as Caitlyn Jenner, Stephen Glass and Tony La Russa. Many of his books and articles are the result of his immersion journalist approach, in which readers become part of the ongoing story. While THE MOSQUITO BOWL is seemingly about an ersatz football game, there is far more here than what occurred on a dirt and coral field on an island in the Pacific in 1944.

This is not a book that will take you into the huddle or locker room and provide volumes of material on football. In fact, discussions of the sport are minimal. The Mosquito Bowl game itself goes by so quickly that you might even miss it. The story presented here is of America at war, planning and preparing for one of the bloodiest battles in US history. Along the way, soldiers from the 4th and 29th Marine regiments found a moment to divert their attention to a football game. The intersection of sports and patriotism is long-standing in American history. During World War II, many of the nation’s finest athletes fought in a battle against fascism and tyranny. Sometimes they could take a break from the war to briefly play the game they loved. They were men at war, but the call once again to be boys on the field was too alluring to avoid.

Participants in the Mosquito Bowl Game included an All-American running back from Purdue and others from Cornell, Notre Dame and Illinois. Another player had been an All-American receiver at Wisconsin, and one had started for the New York Giants. Beyond their football careers, they shared a patriotic spirit that brought them to a Marine combat division. Many who played in the game were in their mid-20s and had been molded into Marine officers to lead younger men still in their teens into battle. Some had enlisted shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor. They had fought their way across the Pacific and were now preparing for a landing on Okinawa, and perhaps an invasion of Japan.

Sixty-five marines suited up for the game. Football uniforms were not part of the issued military gear, so the men wore cut-off dungarees, shorts and marine field shoes. Fifteen hundred fellow marines watched the teams battle to a 0-0 tie. The game itself was long forgotten until Bissinger discovered details in his research of Okinawa.

The Battle of Okinawa occupies the concluding portions of THE MOSQUITO BOWL. Fifteen of the 65 players died, and 20 were wounded. It was the largest number of American athletes to perish in a single battle. The struggle on Okinawa was exacerbated by Japanese tactics that had been shaped after military successes across Pacific islands. The Japanese maintained their belief that they could frustrate American military efforts and somehow still achieve more favorable terms than unconditional surrender.

Bissinger concludes his stirring history with a recognition that the phrase “The Greatest Generation” has become a tired bromide: “There still is far too much misogyny and racism and hatred of the Other in the United States for any generation to be great. But what made the marines special was how they were ordinary men who rose to extraordinary circumstances time and time again. It is the true measure of greatness that most of us never achieve.”

Reviewed by Stuart Shiffman

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're like I am you tend to think that VE Day, May 8, 1945, marked the end of World War II. The War in the Pacific? Oh yeah, that ended the next day. As "The Mosquito Bowl" points out, tell it to the Marines. As the United States methodically gained control of the seas in the Pacific the strategy of island hopping brought the Allies to the doorstep of the Empire of Japan. The last stepping stone was Okinawa and if the Allies controlled this strategic island it would be possible to conduct bombing raids on the Japanese mainland and serve as a staging area for a landing of forces on Japan. Taking Okinawa seemed like a cakewalk. After several days of heavy naval bombing the Marines landed on the island. Like so many other Pacific landings, at first the island seemed deserted. But as the Marines moved inward they met fierce resistance from Japanese forces, estimated at over 100,000 soldiers, who had been concealed in a maze of underground bunkers connected by passages and corridors hidden throughout the island. Some of the fiercest fighting of the war, Europe included, took place on Okinawa.

The cohesive feature of "The Mosquito Bowl" is the extraordinary number of all-star college football players assembled in the lead-up to the Okinawa invasion. There were so many that someone had the idea to stage a football game between these players that included All-Americans from such schools as Notre Dame, Wisconsin, Illinois, Brown, and Tulsa. Many had been drafted by teams in the NFL. Mr. Bissinger follows the journey of several of these players from their home towns in middle-America, during the Depression, through boot camp, to the Mosquito Bowl, to the invasion and, for some of them, their deaths in battle.

A criticism of the book was that despite the title the game gets an "Oh, by the way," and is covered in about a page or two. But obviously the game and its outcome is secondary to profiles in courage of the men who participated. Men? These were boys. I personally believe that we cannot get enough of these books to show younger generations the spirit, courage, and patriotism displayed by the boys from that generation. I also think that the war in Europe tends to suck the air out the room when it comes to war literature. Books about Nazis, Nazi spies, the search for Nazi war criminals, Nazi treasure and the like always seem of greater interest than Japanese war stories. So I wholeheartedly recommend this book as a testament to the bravery of those who fought in the Pacific and hope that more books like it will follow.

[David Lubin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well presented, accurate and informative

The Battle for Okinawa went on for a very long time. The casualties were in very high numbers for combatants and civilians. In many ways, it is difficult to grasp the overall picture so the battle sometimes gets shelved in conversations. This book takes a more poignant view by taking it down to the individual levels. The author makes you feel the individual loss of each Marine and soldier in ways that are very rare. The men who competed against each other in the “Mosquito Bowl” were among the very best of the very best America had to offer. Their fates are presented with compassion and their sacrifice is noted. Having read a great many books on WW2, I have to put this one in the top ten worth reading.

[Philip Riley · Rating 1 out of 5]

I hated this book. This is what happens when a woke, largely American, hating son of a World War II veteran, tries to write a book. The constant references to racism that existed, as if talking about it would change things was annoying. The turgid and completely uninspiring stories of the men Made this an experience to be endured, and certainly not anything I learned from. I don’t know what his point was constantly be reading the greatest generation, constantly tearing down the United States Army at the expense of the Marine Corps, which I guess is the son of a Marine he would do.

The criticism of US policy and US tactics and strategies. I did not find offensive at all, they are real and well documented. The final third of the book, though being the description of each of the 15 men from the mosquito bull, who died in the listing of names, sometimes taking up an entire page I just felt to be on an unimportant exercise.

He says he wrote. This is a tribute to his father, and to all of the Marines, who died there, and he played in a football game that he literally never describes. I understand his antiwar sentiments, but found this to be some thing that I would never recommend anybody, and I finished the book only as an exercise and perseverance. I did like his book Friday night lights, but I can promise you will never read anything he writes again. I think he’s kind of a sad individual and took a story that could’ve been interesting, heartbreaking, and truthful, and turn it into a diatribe on his typically liberal woke politics, and why he hates America. Well lies. Here’s my comment, I hate your writing!

[Ben · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this book and I was excited to read another book by Bissinger after reading Friday Night Lights. In the end, I found this book very boring and not at all what I had hoped.

First, although the title of the book is “The Mosquito Bowl”, the actual game was hardly more than a footnote in the story. I expected a grand build-up leading to the game but more attention and detail was given to military strategies than to the game the book was named for. Also, I felt the characters in this book were uninteresting and I didn’t feel the connection to their stories like in other books, like “The Boys in the Boat”. As a result, I lost track of who was who and it made the book feel a bit scattered.

This book felt like it could have been about 1/2 as long. There was so much filler content about the pacific war strategies, which is fine but it distracted from the main story the author was trying to tell. The result was neither a football story nor a story about the athletes in the Pacific, but was a jumbled mess of a lot of things and lacking a center.

Overall, I do really enjoy Buzz Bissinger’s writing. He is a great author to read and has a beautiful way with words. But as I reflect on this particular story, I think there’s much better WW2 books out there and there’s nothing about this book that stands out as special.

[Matt Karpowicz · Rating 2 out of 5]

Moderately disappointing. Was drawn to this book by its interesting premise regarding formerly distinguished college football players serving in the Marines and how they came together for one last game in the Pacific. The book touched about the football itself for about 20 pages despite its front and back spines marketing almost exclusively about the game’s origins. Nevertheless, the book offered good and unique insight about the Pacific theater, an area I was not overly familiar with. However, there is nothing to distinguish this book from any other nonfiction account of WWII. Additionally, the author’s attempts at weaving in political statements throughout the book seemed shallow, selfish, out of place, and unnecessary. In a book that was supposed to be about the bravery of the Marines on Okinawa, all it did was serve as a distraction. I would not recommend this book to others.

[Jeffrey (Akiva) Savett · Rating 3 out of 5]

As others have stated, the biographies of these young men in the prime of their lives going off to fight in the Pacific theater during WWII is moving, honest, and terrible; but, as others have also noted, I’m taking a couple stars away because the title event of the book is described on ONE PAGE!

Really, the Mosquito Bowl part of this book is really a selling/marketing conceit. And that’s fine; I would have never read about these fascinating young men otherwise. But it’s still sort of disappointing as I was interested in how such a game might have effected morale, and other events after its conclusion.

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

My mind craves knowledge when I read. This nonfictional account of a football game played in WWII Okinawa is just the ticket to satisfy my brain, because the book is chock-full of events, people and information. It’s also a very true depiction of war when it can be a horrid grind. I loved the flow of the book, beginning with the most important men and their families, because soldiers are the most important component of war.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

When my book club chose this book, I wasn’t excited. I’m not particularly interested in military history or stories. One of our members who is very interested in military history, particularly that of the South Pacific, where a relative served, was very excited.
I changed my mind as I read. While not an exceptionally-well-written book, it was insightful, sympathetic, and quite engaging. The lives of soldiers are tragic, heroic, and mundane in varying amounts. Eras are given names to dignify the sacrifices and generations that made them. The reality of war is more nuanced, of course, with people trying to avoid fighting, to make money, to gain over others, or simply to survive. The event of the Mosquito Bowl, its players, and path to it and after, serve to define that era and some of its men.
The tragedy of young death is documented frequently; the bravery; the simple doing of something that had to be done; the potentiality. It is an interesting book for all that. Additionally, I learned more about the strategic thinking that lead to the battles.
It is worth reading both as an account of war from that era and of individual actions.

[Darryl Barney · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title can make you think this non-fiction book has a football focus. Although 50 or so former college stars played a semi-serious very brutal football game on Guadalcanal while waiting to fight on Okinawa, the book is about that insanely bloody WW2 battle between US and Japanese forces.
The 15 players who died in battle are the characters of the book. This was still a time when privileged young men volunteered for the military during war.
The reader is not spared details of how bloody gruesome and on some level, senseless the 3 month battle was. Total deaths were around 200,000 on a somewhat small island; nearly half were civilians.
It was important that Hitler was defeated and part of that was defeating Hitler’s ally Japan In the Pacific so the US had a worthy goal.
The book is very well researched and written, there are about 100 pages of reference notes. There is is so much human destruction I can’t say I enjoyed it.

[Greg Lowe · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Mosquito Bowl

It is a little bit of a bait and switch. The book has little to do with that football game in the South Pacific between players from two marine divisions. It does give us the stories of collegiate football stars who become marines in World War II, many of whom die in the battle for Okinawa. The latter part of the book is rather depressing as many of these real life characters who we have come like, to respect, to admire, ultimately die on the battlefield. In that sense, it accurately portrays what war is. It shows the fanaticism of the Japanese soldiers defending the islands and gives insight into the wisdom of utilizing the two atomic bombs. As odd as it feels to say it, that decision probably did save lives.

It also has a couple of chapters describing the affect of kamikaze attacks on naval vessels off the shores of Okinawa. My dad was on a ship off that island in 1945 although I am not sure that those attacks were still taking place when he was there. I would like to talk to him about it, but like so many WWII veterans, he is no longer with us.

Overall I was not liking the book, but then in the epilogue, the author addressed the feelings I had… about the loss of so many bright young lives. Sometimes war is necessary; that particular war did seem to be. But necessary or not, war is a horrible waste of human life. The Mosquito Bowl certainly reminds us of that truth.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

A powerful read that will punch you in the gut and have you laugh out loud...

I just listened to the the entire book in one sitting after watching Mr. His singer's interview on Morning Joe the other day I knew I had to buy his book. I am no a fan of documentaries in any format but I am so glad I went with my gut on this one. My Dad was at Okinawa and he too never talked about it.

There are so many small treasures in this book that will stay with me forever... I will harken back to this book every time I hear GSW on a police procedural, see a wheelbarrow or a bull. While I'm not into college football, I'm a huge fan of NFL and the history of both was great. And this Sunday I will be thinking of a very special game that serendipitously ending in a tie was played by some of the greatest boys that America can be proud to say that they are theirs.

Yes they were the Greatest Generation, not perfect - no one is - but when the job needed to be done they did it. The folks at home rallied and did what needed to be done.

I highly recommend this book. If nothing else to open your eyes that war is hell and perhaps those in charge need work very hard to keep our boys and girls from going there again.

[Hal Brodsky · Rating 4 out of 5]

An imperfect but well-researched book about the Marines in the Pacific theater. Despite the title, it has little to do with football and even less with the game in question.
The author effectively demonstrates and laments the frequent unnecessary and random loss of life (American and especially Japanese) in the war.
The book is harmed by the author's unnecessary interjections of the F word for shock value and his occasional sophomoric editorializing at the end if some chapters, usually through sudden ironic catchphrases that seem misplaced and unnecessary.

[Abbie Riddle · Rating 5 out of 5]

And then there are books that change your life.....remind you of the sacrifices that are often made without thought.

Bissinger's book is a book that covers a football game that has been long forgotten by most and yet it reveals that even in the midst of war and hardship soldiers long for the normalcy of their lives.
This book left me contemplating the lives lost, the innocence given up and the hardships endured. Too often we tend to romanticize battles, war, the duties of soldiers. We relegate them to a story that can be made to feel different from the actual circumstances. And yet, in the midst of it all are boys and young men about to face the battle of their lives - many of them will not return from the it.

Recently my 18 year old son stood leaning on the wall as I cooked dinner. "Mom," he said, "do you realize that 1/3 men do not return from battle? So if Ben, Judah and J and I all were drafted only 2-3 of us would return" I stood there, stirring the food, and was shocked. Not that I did not realize the statistics of battle but that when he mentioned all my boys in one sentence and stated it so plainly I felt suddenly numb. I was hit with images of them facing atrocities that are hard to recover from if they even make it back home. I thought of the hardships faced by veterans even now. And.....And I thought about this book.

Simply a must read. I will be purchasing a copy when it is available.

[Caroline · Rating 2 out of 5]

three stars for the history, but the way this was formatted and written… interesting!!! there was one chapter i loved where a research mission was recounted by hour to make it more eventized, but it was even more engaging than the singular mosquito bowl chapter? like buzz plz anywhooooo cw for bill to eat in the film 🙂‍↕️

[Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very sad and moving book. The horror of war comes through clearly. The men who die are our friends and neighbors and schoolmates.Why did they have to die so young with their best years ahead of them?

[Bobby Pillote · Rating 4 out of 5]

A moving historical narrative that ultimately focuses on war more than football. I appreciate Bissinger’s attention to detail and nuance in addressing history; no stone is left unturned and no black mark is skipped over. Even experienced history buffs will learn new things about the Pacific Theater by reading this book.

[Kevin Keating · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book bogged down a little. Couldn't really get into the lives of the characters before I knew them. Kinda wanted to hear about the game between two marine regiments, but that played a minor part. The parts after the game were well written and the book picked up again.

[Ashley Basile · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't really understand why this book is titled "The Mosquito Bowl". While I found the information and stories of the soldiers featured, I would have liked to at least read more about the game itself. That being said, I did learn a few things I hadn't realized before today.