On 7 May 1915 the Cunard liner Lusitania, the fastest ship of its day, steaming from New York to Liverpool, was torpedoed by a German submarine 12 miles off the coast of southern Ireland, not far from Cobh. It sank in 18 minutes: 1,198 passengers and crew, including three German stowaways and 123 Americans, perished. Only six of 22 lifeboats were launched. Many passengers drowned because they donned their life-jackets incorrectly and could not keep their heads bobbing above water. There were 764 survivors. This unprecedented attack on civilians caused a storm of indignation, particularly in the US, which expected its citizens to be immune from international violence.
Until 1914 the established naval rules provided that warships could stop and search merchant vessels, but must safeguard their crews. Passenger ships were exempt from attack. The sinking of civilian ships without rescuing their voyagers, said Winston Churchill, then first lord of the admiralty, leaving them “to perish in open boats or drown amid the waves was in the eyes of all seafaring peoples a grisly act, which hitherto had never been practised except by pirates”.
issybird
10-20-2017 01:13 PM
I'm going to nominate The End: The Defiance and Destruction of Hitler's Germany, 1944-1945 by Ian Kershaw, price set by Penguin at $4.99, Whispersync audio an additional $7.49. Rated over four stars at Goodreads.
Spoiler:
Countless books have been written about why Nazi Germany lost World War II, yet remarkably little attention has been paid to the equally vital question of how and why it was able to hold out as long as it did. The Third Reich did not surrender until Germany had been left in ruins and almost completely occupied. Even in the near-apocalyptic final months, when the war was plainly lost, the Nazis refused to sue for peace. Historically, this is extremely rare.
Drawing on original testimony from ordinary Germans and arch-Nazis alike, award-winning historian Ian Kershaw explores this fascinating question in a gripping and focused narrative that begins with the failed bomb plot in July 1944 and ends with the German capitulation in May 1945. Hitler, desperate to avoid a repeat of the "disgraceful" German surrender in 1918, was of course critical to the Third Reich's fanatical determination, but his power was sustained only because those below him were unable, or unwilling, to challenge it. Even as the military situation grew increasingly hopeless, Wehrmacht generals fought on, their orders largely obeyed, and the regime continued its ruthless persecution of Jews, prisoners, and foreign workers. Beneath the hail of allied bombing, German society maintained some semblance of normalcy in the very last months of the war. The Berlin Philharmonic even performed on April 12, 1945, less than three weeks before Hitler's suicide.
As Kershaw shows, the structure of Hitler's "charismatic rule" created a powerful negative bond between him and the Nazi leadership- they had no future without him, and so their fates were inextricably tied. Terror also helped the Third Reich maintain its grip on power as the regime began to wage war not only on its ideologically defined enemies but also on the German people themselves. Yet even as each month brought fresh horrors for civilians, popular support for the regime remained linked to a patriotic support of Germany and a terrible fear of the enemy closing in.
Based on prodigious new research, Kershaw's The End is a harrowing yet enthralling portrait of the Third Reich in its last desperate gasps.
Some good nominations here. Touch choices. I'm going to wait to see what else is nominated before using my remaining two nods.
drofgnal
10-20-2017 01:44 PM
Is this a non-fiction category or is historical fiction allowed?
drofgnal
10-20-2017 01:49 PM
I'll second 'The End: The Defiance and Destruction of Hitler's Germany, 1944-1945'
I'd nominate the Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, but at 1280 pages print, that's a bit much for me for a monthly book club read. I'll just have to digest that one in bits and pieces here and there.
JSWolf
10-20-2017 01:50 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by drofgnal
(Post 3597395)
Is this a non-fiction category or is historical fiction allowed?
It's non-fiction.
issybird
10-20-2017 01:54 PM
Just a heads up, people. With one exception ;) the books nominated so far cost from $11.99 to $14.99. Experience has shown that's far too rich for this club; it's certainly too rich for me. Linking to OD doesn't establish whether a member's library has it or its availability. For one title, I'm looking at roughly Memorial Day if not the Fourth of July.
JSWolf
10-20-2017 01:58 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by WT Sharpe
(Post 3597110)
* The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America by Erik Larson [JSWolf] Goodreads / Overdrive Print Length: 447 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:
Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America’s rush toward the twentieth century.
The architect was Daniel Hudson Burnham, the fair’s brilliant director of works and the builder of many of the country’s most important structures, including the Flatiron Building in New York and Union Station in Washington, D.C.
The murderer was Henry H. Holmes, a young doctor who, in a malign parody of the White City, built his “World’s Fair Hotel” just west of the fairgrounds — a torture palace complete with dissection table, gas chamber, and 3,000-degree crematorium. Burnham overcame tremendous obstacles and tragedies as he organized the talents of Frederick Law Olmsted, Charles McKim, Louis Sullivan, and others to transform swampy Jackson Park into the White City, while Holmes used the attraction of the great fair and his own satanic charms to lure scores of young women to their deaths.
What makes the story all the more chilling is that Holmes really lived, walking the grounds of that dream city by the lake ‘The Devil in the White City' draws the reader into a time of magic and majesty, made all the more appealing by a supporting cast of real-life characters, including Buffalo Bill, Theodore Dreiser, Susan B. Anthony, Thomas Edison, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, and others.
In this book the smoke, romance, and mystery of the Gilded Age come alive as never before. Erik Larson’s gifts as a storyteller are magnificently displayed in this rich narrative of the master builder, the killer, and the great fair that obsessed them both.
Please remove this as it's already been a book club entry.
JSWolf
10-20-2017 02:03 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by issybird
(Post 3597402)
Just a heads up, people. With one exception ;) the books nominated so far cost from $11.99 to $14.99. Experience has shown that's far too rich for this club; it's certainly too rich for me. Linking to OD doesn't establish whether a member's library has it or its availability. For one title, I'm looking at roughly Memorial Day if not the Fourth of July.
One Summer audiobook is available at BPL.
issybird
10-20-2017 02:22 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by JSWolf
(Post 3597409)
One Summer audiobook is available at BPL.
Thanks, Jon. I've already listened to it (Bryson is a lousy narrator, btw) and read Dead Wake. :)
I really meant my post as a PSA; I don't want people to be blindsided by a good-sounding book that turns out not to be a viable option for them. I also think it would be helpful if nominators paid more attention to price in the interest of greater participation. I always figure book club nominations are like eating in a fancy restaurant; you read the menu from right to left.
BenG
10-20-2017 02:32 PM
I don't love Bryson's reading. He is just average as a narrator but not bad enough to affect my enjoyment of the story.
Of course if you look at it as a performance rather than as a guy doing a decent job of just reading the book you may have a different opinion.
You can get the Audible book for $9.49 if you buy the Kindle ebook.
John F
10-20-2017 02:40 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by drofgnal
(Post 3597395)
Is this a non-fiction category or is historical fiction allowed?
IMO, fiction nominations are welcome.
drofgnal
10-20-2017 02:42 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by John F
(Post 3597432)
IMO, fiction nominations are welcome.
Some historical fiction is more accurate than others. War and Peace is extremely accurate in the military phases of the book, down to comminque between Generals being the actual. Other historical fiction, not so much.
BenG
10-20-2017 02:46 PM
It may not get as many votes if people feel its outside of the month's genre. But that may be affected by what else is nominated.
Dutchbook
10-20-2017 03:05 PM
I'm nominating Max Havelaar, or The coffee auctions of the Dutch trading company
Max Havelaar - a Dutch civil servant in Java - burns with an insatiable desire to end the ill treatment and oppression inflicted on the native peoples by the colonial administration. Max is an inspirational figure, but he is also a flawed idealist whose vow to protect the Javanese from cruelty ends in his own downfall. In Max Havelaar, Multatuli (the pseudonym for Eduard Douwes Dekker) vividly recreated his own experiences in Java and tellingly depicts the hypocrisy of those who gained from the corrupt coffee trade. Sending shockwaves through the Dutch nation when it was published in 1860, this damning exposé of the terrible conditions in the colonies led to welfare reforms in Java and continues to inspire the fairtrade movement today.
