'An extraordinary and well-told tale of mountains, myths and mass-murder'

'His research is prodigious and chilling... a wide-ranging book which offers a warning about the dangers of alternative history'

'A stunning digest of the expedition to uncover the beginnings of the Aryan people'

'Hale's fascinating and thoughtful book grips from the start...a thought-provoking and important addition to the history of the twentieth century'

'Gripping and well-researched...Hale is to be commended'

Andrew Hodge’s book is of exemplary scholarship and sympathy. Intimate, perceptive and insightful, it’s also the most readable biography I’ve picked up in some time

Save your money for the forthcoming new edition of Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges, regarded by many as one of the greatest biographies of anyone, let along Turing

This book stands the test of time. It is a labour of love…compelling

Authoritative biography

Hodges's biography is sensitive, sympathetic and uncompromisingly intellectual. The maths is extremely hard work – but helps the lay reader to appreciate the scale of Turing's achievements

A rich and fascinating portrait of a genius whose life was tragically ended before its time

A brilliant contribution

Clark is fully alive to the challenges of the subject ... He provides vivid portraits of leading figures ... [He] also gives a rich sense of what contemporaries believed was at stake in the crises leading up to the war

In recent decades, many analysts had tended to put most blame for the disaster [of the First World War] on Germany. Clark strongly renews an older interpretation which sees the statesmen of many countries as blundering blindly together into war

A warm, affectionate portrait of the ballet world, and of success tinged with sadness

Thrilling

Utterly fascinating, and grippingly well-written. With extraordinary skill Wade Davis manages to weave together such disparate strands as Queen Victoria's Indian Raj, the 'Great Game' of intrigue against Russia, the horrors of the Somme, and Britain's obsession to conquer the world's highest peak

Davis’ descriptions of the trenches – the bodies, the smell, the madness – are some of the best I’ve ever read

Sheds new light on history that we thought we knew... meticulously detailed and very readable

The miracle is that there isn’t a dull page. As it moves towards its deadly climax, the story hangs together as tightly as a thriller. Into the Silence is as monumental as the mountain that soars above it; small wonder that it won the 2012 Samuel Johnson prize for non-fiction … Once you start wandering the snowy passes with Mallory and the lads, you won’t want to come down again. There can be no better way, surely, to spend a week in winter

He sees the climbers as haunted dreamers, harrowed by their desperate experiences in the First World War, living amid romantic dreams of Imperial grandeur and the elemental, sublime grandeur of the mountain

This is the awesomely researched story of Mallory, Irvine and the early Everest expeditions. It puts their efforts and motivations into the context of Empire and the first world war in a way I don’t think previous books have ever managed

A vivid depiction of a monumental story…Wade Davis’ passion for the book shines through and I can only hope that his next book doesn’t take as long to write as I will certainly be reading it