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bettie

Bettie's Books

A Stuga On the Cusp of the Orust Riviera, tucked away next to a hobbit hole in the woods.

The Guns of August

The Guns of August - Barbara W. Tuchman, Nadia May

bookshelves: summer-2013, tbr-busting-2013, published-1962, pulitzer, wwi, nonfiction, fraudio, history

Read from July 22 to August 24, 2013

 

To crack open in August!

Fraudo> Rosado> Read by Nadia May
Non-Fic> History> wwI
Summer 2013> tbr 2013
Pulitzer
Pub 1962

I never did understand how France, on the defensive, managed to capture Alsace'

Lines like that is what makes Tuchman engaging and just right for my August epic non-fiction. The opening:

So gorgeous was the spectacle on the May morning of 1910 when nine kings rode in the funeral of Edward VII of England that the crowd, waiting in hushed and black-clad awe, could not keep back gasps of admiration. In scarlet and blue and green and purple, three by three the sovereigns rode through the palace gates, with plumed helmets, gold braid, crimson sashes, and jeweled orders flashing in the sun. After them came five heirs apparent, forty more imperial or royal highnesses, seven queens--four dowager and three regnant--and a scattering of special ambassadors from uncrowned countries. Together they represented seventy nations in the greatest assemblage of royalty and rank ever gathered in one place and, of its kind, the last. The muffled tongue of Big Ben tolled nine by the clock as the cortege left the palace, but on history's clock it was sunset, and the sun of the old world was setting in a dying blaze of splendor never to be seen again.

So Good. Tuchman had the trick of research and writing it all up in such a compelling way.

5*



4* A Distant Mirror
3* The Proud Tower
3* The Zimmermann Telegram
TR Stilwell and the American Experience in China
CR The Guns of August