For Erik Larson, the research in which he delves and delights for each project more than rubs off in readership appeal and enticing and informative enjoyment. "I love looking for pieces of things in far-flung archives,” he once said in an interview. “…You don't have to make it up."
Moreover, his vision has always focused on compelling narrative history of incidents and eras, as showcased in his Edgar Award winning The Devil in the White City, about the architect and age of the great Chicago World’s Fair of 1893, which served as the backdrop for the account of a serial killer who exploited the exposition to ensnare his victims. In Isaac’s Storm Larson chronicles how the massive Galveston hurricane of September 1900 killed as many as 10,000 in that Texas city alone, leading to larger new assessments about the causes and effects of such destructive and deadly natural forces. And by imposing scientific stratagems on murder at the turn of the 20th century London, Larson enhances the true crime tale in Thunderstruck centering on two disparate men, the genius Guglielmo Marconi, inventor of wireless transatlantic communication, and the notorious English killer Dr. H.H. Crippen.
With the absorbing yet unsettling In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin, however, Larson “made no effort … to write another grand history of the age,” he declares. “My objective was more intimate: to reveal that past world through the experience and perceptions of my two primary subjects,” as the real-life figures embarked on “a journey of discovery, transformation, and, ultimately, deepest heartbreak.”
It’s the account of Berlin, starting in 1933, from the increasingly discerning eyes of two Americans, President Roosevelt's ambassador to Germany, William E. Dodd, an academic historian who hoped Nazism would somehow lose steam, and Dodd's daughter Martha, a 24-year-old free spirit who initially appreciated Nazism's vitality and the social life and love affair after love affair she soon garnered. At first this new world seemed full of novelty and new horizons for both of them, but slowly — until the calamitous weekend that changed them forever – disenchantment and dark clouds of intrigue and dread fell over the whole Dodd family (which included Dodd’s wife Mattie, and a son, Bill).
Article comments
1 - Sverige
. Though I appreciate good history I was a bit worried that back to back historical books would wear me out, but that opposite is true. This book proves that hindsight is 20/20, even when staring in the face of ultimate evil and insanity. Throughout our educations are taught of the events of WWII. This book puts you in the the shoes of the people that had first hand experiences of the events that lead up to it, the propaganda, the denial, and ultimately the simple hope that IT wouldn't happen. Great read!