Previously Read Books
March 2023
Hitler's American Gamble by Brendan Simms and Charlie Laderman
A riveting account of the five most crucial days in twentieth-century diplomatic history: from Pearl Harbor to Hitler’s declaration of war on the United States.
By early December 1941, war had changed much of the world beyond recognition. Nazi Germany occupied most of the European continent, while in Asia, the Second Sino-Japanese War had turned China into a battleground. But these conflicts were not yet inextricably linked - and the United States remained at peace.
Hitler’s American Gamble recounts the five days that upended everything: December 7 to 11.
Tracing developments in real time and backed by deep archival research, historians Brendan Simms and Charlie Laderman show how Hitler’s intervention was not the inexplicable decision of a man so bloodthirsty that he forgot all strategy, but a calculated risk that can only be understood in a truly global context.
This book reveals how December 11, not Pearl Harbor, was the real watershed that created a world war and transformed international history.
February 2023
Munich by Robert Harris
With this electrifying novel about treason and conscience, loyalty and betrayal, "Harris has brought history to life with exceptional skill". This spy thriller is set against the backdrop of the fateful Munich Conference of September 1938.
Hugh Legat is a rising star of the British diplomatic service, serving at 10 Downing Street as a private secretary to the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain. Paul von Hartmann is on the staff of the German Foreign Office - and secretly a member of the anti-Hitler resistance. The two men were friends at Oxford in the 1920s, but have not been in contact since.
Now, when Hugh flies with Chamberlain from London to Munich, and Hartmann travels on Hitler's train overnight from Berlin, their paths are set on a disastrous collision course.
And once again, Robert Harris gives us actual events of historical importance--here are Hitler, Chamberlain, Mussolini, Daladier--at the heart of an electrifying, unputdownable novel.