2017 Reading Challenge discussion

Just finished this one. It isn't my favorite work of his but still decent. Here is what I wrote about it: My writeup

Another Erik Larson fan here. I agree with you about In the Garden of Beasts. I didn't like it as well as The Devil in the White City, which is one of my all-time favourite books, but I'm pleased to say that Beasts has stuck with me. Whenever I stumble across the Dodds now, especially daughter Martha, the whole book presents itself to my mind again, and I have a comprehensive context for the new information.

This category had to be filled by an Erik Larson or a David McCullough for me. My library rustled up Dead Wake before The Wright Brothers, so I got to read Larson's work first.

Again, not as good as Devil in my opinion, but Devil sets a pretty high bar. And Larson's research, choice of material and arrangement of narrative threads is top-notch as always.

The book chronicles the events in early May, 1915, that led up to the sinking of Lusitania, which was torpedoed by German submarine U-20 about ten miles from the coast of Ireland. Larson's tight narration makes the book read like a thriller, even though we all know what happens.

Larson has mastered the chronology of various events so well that he can speculate about some fascinating "what-ifs". What if Lusitania hadn't been delayed by a few hours in leaving from New York by the transfer of passengers from another Cunard ship, Cameronia? What if the longitudinal coal bunkers hadn't been almost empty when the torpedo struck the ship?

Erik Larson is a resident of the greater Seattle area, as I am, and I have been lucky enough to see and hear him speak at Town Hall. He's as engaging in person as he is on paper.

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