I'm Canadian and had been told growing up that WW1 was a nation-defining conflict for Canada, in large part because of the success of Canadian troops in Europe. That being said, I always suspected that this might have been a bit exagerated out of patriotism/nationalism. Were Canadians truly so successful that they achieved any objective they were given? What factors, such as leadership, training, doctrine, and individual hardiness contributed to this success? Can anyone recommend an approachable history of Canada in The Great War? Thanks!
This is a post I made some time ago on the Canadian Corps and why it performed relatively well in WWI.
But let's not get carried away here the claim that they "never once failed to capture an objective" is demonstrably false. We have only to look at the efforts subsequent to the capture of Vimy ridge to see that the Canadian Corps was prey to all the very same problems that dogged all other combatants on the Western Front - Infantry were desperately vulnerable without artillery support and woe betide any infantry attack that lost its barrage.
I can't say I know of any books focussed exclusively on Canada in WWI but I can recommend Forgotten Victory by Gary Sheffield and White Heat by John Terraine as general reading about the BEF's experience on the Western Front.
I'm sorry if this is not the answer you're looking for, as I'm a little busy right now to make a composed post, but this is at the top and I at least want to provide some sources for your last question asking for approachable histories of Canada in the Great War! My principal sources for Canada in the Great War are:
Tim Cook, Shock Troops: Canadians Fighting The Great War 1917-1918
Tim Cook, No Place to Run: The Canadian Corps and Gas Warfare in the First World War
Tim Cook, At the Sharp End Volume One: Canadians Fighting The Great War 1914 To 1916
Nathan Greenfield, Baptism of Fire: The Second Battle of Ypres and the Forging of Canada
As you can see, Tim Cook is kind of a rockstar in this respect. Pretty much any work by him in this field is worth picking up but those are the best. Make sure to get the paperback version of No Place to Run -- it goes for as low as $5 compared to the hardcover going for about $110. Needless to say I'd take Meyer's works with a grain of salt but it's based in a reality -- the Canadians were exceptional soldiers and were given the designation as 'shock troops' very fairly.
I'll follow up on /u/elos_ recommendations with Pierre Berton's Marching As To War, which places the WWI experience into context alongside the Boer War, WWII and the Korean War, a 54-year stretch from the autumn of 1899 to the summer of 1953 that turned Canada from a colony to a proud and independent nation, he argues.
Berton wrote about a billion books before he died, and his stuff is older (and shows that age), but he's a Canadian author who wrote well, and his books are extremely approachable and fast-paced.
Berton's general argument in Marching is that Canadian soldiers had to overcome monstrous obstacles in terms of supply and leadership shortfalls, and that interwar political decisions caused unnecessary casualties and hardship. Nevertheless, ordinary soldiers overcame those obstacles and triumphed over them as much as the battlefield enemy.
Does Meyer include the Dominion of Newfoundland as being part of this? Because if does, Beaumont-Hamel, during the Battle of the Somme was an incredible tragedy, with 90% of the Newfoundland Regiment perishing in 30 minutes without getting to the German trenches.