Hello there, and welcome to another episode of Inside the Cover.

As always, it is such a pleasure to be with you.

We have another great book to share with you, and it's another loan for my professorial friend Randy.

So, you know it's a good one.

Tonight's book is The Restles Wave by Admiral James Stavridis.

It was copyrighted in 2024, and I finished the book on February 14th, 2025.

The book is subtitled A Novel of the United States Navy, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Is now time to go inside the cover.

Stavridis spen more than 30 years in the U.S.

Navy, rising to the rank of four star admiral.

He graduated from the U.S.

Naval Academy in 1976.

He was Supreme Allied Commander at NATO and previously commanded the U.S.

Southern Command, overseeing military operations through Latin America.

He holds a PhD from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, where he recently served five years as dean.

He is the chair of the boar of the Rockefeller Foundation, and he has published 13 other books.

Hes clearly a significant man.

Admiral Stavridis points out that the book is very much a work of fiction.

However, he goes on to write that he set out to write this book as an examination of the voyage of character of talented but flawe individuals at a critical time in the history of the United States.

He also notes that while the dialog among the participants is largely his invention, the military actio is almost entirely fact based, and there is a lot of naval military action from Pearl Harbor to the Coral Sea, Midway, and Guadalcanal.

In fact, the book begins rather dramatically on December 7th, 1941.

The principal protagonist is Scott Bradley James, a young ma who grew up in the Florida Keys.

Scott was born in 1920 and grew up on boats and learned from his father every aspect of the water world that surrounded him and Key West.

He also polished his skills as a boxer and learne to play a decent game of poker.

The Restless Wave is largely a coming of age story for Scott Bradley James, who was dubbe the man with three first names by his first roommate at the Naval Academy.

Scott earns an appointment to the U.S.

Naval Academy as a member of the class of 1941.

Although he is not precisely clear why he wants to be a naval officer, the book follows Scott through his four years at the Academy, where he is successful in spite of a personal tragedy involving a young lady friend and a serious potentia cheating scandal at the Academy.

After early graduation because of the threatening world situation, we follow Scott and a couple of his classmates as they pursue their military careers.

Through triumph and tragedy in the Pacific theater.

In The Restless Wave, it is written that Scott could see that the ability of United States to continuously produce ships by the dozen every few months was something the Japanese were never going to be able to match.

Stavridis indicates that he will be writing a series of books that follow the exploits, both professional and personal, of Scott Bradley James beyond World War Two.

I found James to be a bit of a flawed hero, and I am not certain what I think of him.

I guess I will have to wait until the next book to see if and how he matures, and where he goes next.

Tonight's book has been The Restless Wave by Admiral James Stavridis.

Randy brought it to my attention and I am happy to share it with you.

Good night.

Until we meet again.

Keep a book in your hands, mind and heart.