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The Great Influenza
The Great Influenza
Oct 3, 2024 3:21 PM

Author:John M Barry,Scott Brick

The Great Influenza

Brought to you by Penguin.

THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

In 1918, the world faced the deadliest pandemic in human history. What can the story of the so-called Spanish Flu teach us about the fight against present day crises, and how to prepare for future outbreaks?

At the height of WWI, history's most lethal influenza virus erupted in an army camp in Kansas, moved east with American troops, then exploded, killing as many as 100 million people worldwide. It killed more people in twenty-four months than AIDS killed in twenty-four years, more in a year than the Black Death killed in a century. But this was not the Middle Ages, and 1918 marked the first collision of science and epidemic disease.

Magisterial in its breadth of perspective and depth of research, The Great Influenza is ultimately a tale of triumph amid tragedy, which provides us with a precise and sobering model as we confront the aftermath of Covid-19 and future pandemics looming on the horizon.

'Everything you need to know about one of the deadliest outbreaks in human history' Bill Gates

'Easily our fullest, richest, most panoramic history of the subject' New York Times Book Review

© John M Barry 2004 (P) Penguin Audio 2020

Reviews

'Easily our fullest, richest, most panoramic history of the subject'

—— New York Times Book Review

'A sobering account of the 1918 flu epidemic, compelling and timely'

—— Boston Globe

'History brilliantly written... The Great Influenza is a masterpiece'

—— Baton Rouge Advocate

Holland argues very effectively that the success of Husky was a turning point in the war

—— Times Literary Supplement

Holland makes the capture of the island one of the great turning-point battles of the war

—— Military History Matters

James Holland delivers the account in his usual engaging style and supplements it with excellent pictures and maps

—— Soldier Magazine

Revelatory

—— BBC History Extra

Brilliantly blending his historical fact with vivid personal testimony by participants, Holland makes a persuasive case for the conquest of Sicily as a turning-point in the war

—— Daily Mail

A brilliant overview of the war in Italy from the perspective of the female partisans

—— Clare Mulley , Spectator, *Books of 2019*

Moorehead skilfully weaves…threads of individual stories together to create a web of interconnected lives… broad narrative is dotted with flashes of detail; the colour of a piece of clothing, the wording of a letter… Moorehead captures a sense of hope and vitality among the women of the Resistance, fighting with courage and determination for a future they believed in

—— Elsa Maishman , Scotland on Sunday

Moorehead … takes up the story of four friends in Turin who decided passive resistance was no longer enough [against Mussolini’s reign] and joined a growing partisan movement based in the remote valleys of Piedmont. This is a bittersweet tale, not of betrayal, exactly, but of subtle excision from the script

—— The Tablet

A House in the Mountains is a page-turner… This book is to be welcomed as a highly readable story in its own right, and as an accessible introduction to the role of women in the Resistenza

—— Christian Goeschel , BBC History

A deeply-researched, fast-paced account of the Italian Resistance, a story not widely known to the general reader

—— History of War

This is a highly satisfying conclusion to the author's series. Excellent, well-presented evidence of the incalculable strengths and abilities of women to create and run a country

—— Starred Review , Kirkus

[A] moving finale of a quartet of books on resistance to fascism

—— Economist

[An] encyclopedic new account... a vivid, meticulous tapestry, densely weaving the threads of German and Soviet military strategy, political calculation from Washington and London to Moscow, and war's pitiless human cost

—— Julian Evans , The Telegraph

[Dimbleby] skilfully tracks the shifts and turns of the campaign, sparing no detail . . . a riveting account

—— Tony Rennell , Daily Mail, Book of the Week

Dimbleby tells the story of strategic miscalculation and (self-)deception on all sides, and then Hitler's 'war of extermination', magnificently

—— Allan Mallinson , The Spectator

Amazing . . . fascinating

—— Jeremy Vine

My best history book of 2021 -- a masterful account of maybe the biggest event ever . . . essential!

—— Lee Child

A very open and honest account of a centenarian's life . . . You cannot help but be amazed

—— Who Do You Think You Are?

Embark on an enchanting journey into our country's past hundred years through the remarkable life of Captain Sir Tom Moore

—— Eastern Daily Press

This minute-by-minute retelling tackles the big questions, but also - by drawing on the letters and diaries from the Dresden City Archive - never loosed sight of the experiences of people who witnessed, and suffered, the attach first-hand

—— BBC History Revealed, Book of the Month

It's a wonderful book, so absorbing, thoughtful and thought provoking, I didn't want it to end

—— Maureen Waller, author of London 1945: Life in the Debris of War

The story of the Allied bombing of Dresden in 1945 is well known, but McKay's searing account is in a league of its own. His research is first-class, his writing elegant and emotive. He is brilliant at portraying the city's prewar beauty, grimly powerful on the horror of the firestorm, and moving and thoughtful about Dresden's rise from the ashes. By the end, I was itching to jump on a flight to Germany. That tells you about the skill and spirit of this terrific book

—— Dominic Sandbrook , The Times/Sunday Times Books of the Year
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