In February 1945 the Allies obliterated Dresden, the 'Florence of the Elbe'. Explosive bombs weighing over 1,000 lbs fell every seven and a half seconds and an estimated 25,000 people were killed. Was Dresden a legitimate military target or was the bombing a last act of atavistic mass murder in a war already won?\nFrom the history of the city to the attack itself, conveyed in a minute-by-minute account from the first of the flares to the flames reaching almost a mile high - the wind so searingly hot that the lungs of those in its path were instantly scorched - through the eerie period of reconstruction, bestselling author Sinclair McKay creates a vast canvas and brings it alive with touching human detail.\nAlong the way we encounter, for example, a Jewish woman who thought the English bombs had been sent from heaven, novelist Kurt Vonnegut who wrote that the smouldering landscape was like walking on the surface of the moon, and 15-year-old Winfried Bielss, who, having spent the evening ushering refugees, wanted to get home to his stamp collection. He was not to know that there was not enough time.\nImpeccably researched and deeply moving, McKay uses never-before-seen sources to relate the untold stories of civilians and vividly conveys the texture of life in a decimated city. Dresden is invoked as a byword for the illimitable cruelties of war, but with the ever-lengthening distance of time, it is now possible to approach this subject with a much clearer gaze, less occluded with the weight of prejudice in either direction, and with a keener interest in the sorts of lives that ordinary people lived and lost, or tried to rebuild.\nFrom general and individual morality in war to the raw, primal instinct for survival, through the seemingly unstoppable gravity of mass destruction and the manipulation of memory, this is a master historian at work.\n'Extraordinary . . . a remarkably faithful account' Guardian on The Secret Life of Bletchley Park\n'Painstakingly researched and fascinating' John Harding, Daily Mail on The Secret Listeners\n'Lucid, well-researched and rich in detail' John Preston, Daily Mail on The Spies of Winter\n'Fascinating, riveting, unsettling, and wonderfully rich in period detail' Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday on Mile End Murder

Dresden

McKay, Sinclair

VIKIN

Berlin

An almighty storm hit Berlin in the last days of April 1945. Enveloped by the unstoppable force of East and West, explosive shells pounded buildings while the inhabitants of a once glorious city sheltered in dark cellars - just like their Fuhrer in his bunker. The Battle of Berlin was a key moment in history; marking the end of a deathly regime, the defeated city was ripped in two by the competing superpowers of the Cold War.\nIn Berlin, bestselling historian Sinclair McKay draws on never-before-seen first-person accounts to paint a picture of a city ravaged by ideology, war and grief. Yet to fully grasp the fall of Berlin, it is crucial to also explore in detail the years beforehand and to trace the city being rebuilt, as two cities, in the aftermath. From the passionate and austere Communists of 1919 to the sleek and serious industrialists of 1949, and from the glitter of innovation from artists such as George Grosz to the desperate border crossings for three decades from 1961, this is a story of a city that shaped an entire century, as seen through the eyes not of its rulers, but of those who walked its streets.

History

Military

A Times/Sunday Times Book of the Year\n'Powerful . . . there is rage in his ink. McKay's book grips by its passion and originality. Some 25,000 people perished in the firestorm that raged through the city. I have never seen it better described' Max Hastings, Sunday Times\nIn February 1945 the Allies obliterated Dresden, the 'Florence of the Elbe'. Explosive bombs weighing over 1,000 lbs fell every seven and a half seconds and an estimated 25,000 people were killed. Was Dresden a legitimate military target or was the bombing a last act of atavistic in a war already won?\nFrom the history of the city to the attack itself, conveyed in a minute-by-minute account from the first of the flares to the flames reaching almost a mile high - the wind so searingly hot that the lungs of those in its path were instantly scorched - through the eerie period of reconstruction, bestselling author Sinclair McKay creates a vast canvas and brings it alive with touching human detail.\nAlong the way we encounter, among many others across the city, a Jewish woman who thought the English bombs had been sent from heaven, novelist Kurt Vonnegut who wrote that the smouldering landscape was like walking on the surface of the moon, and 15-year-old Winfried Bielss, who, having spent the evening ushering refugees, wanted to get home to his stamp collection. He was not to know that there was not enough time.\nImpeccably researched and deeply moving, McKay uses never-before-seen sources to relate the untold stories of civilians and vividly conveys the texture of contemporary life. Dresden is invoked as a byword for the illimitable cruelties of war, but with the distance of time, it is now possible to approach this subject with a much clearer gaze, and with a keener interest in the sorts of lives that ordinary people lived and lost, or tried to rebuild.\nWriting with warmth and colour about morality in war, the instinct for survival, the gravity of mass destruction and the manipulation of memory, this is a master historian at work.\n'Churchill said that if bombing cities was justified, it was always repugnant. Sinclair McKay has written a shrewd, humane and balanced account of this most controversial target of the Anglo-American strategic bombing campaign, the ferocious consequence of the scourge of sm' Allan Mallinson, author of Fight to the Finish\n'Beautifully-crafted, elegiac, compelling - Dresden delivers with a dark intensity and incisive compassion rarely equalled. Authentic and authoritative, a masterpiece of its genre' Damien Lewis, author of Zero Six Bravo\n'Compelling . . . Sinclair McKay brings a dark subject vividly to life' Keith Lowe, author of Savage Continent\n'This is a brilliantly clear, and fair, account of one of the most notorious and destructive raids in the history aerial warfare. From planning to execution, the story is told by crucial participants - and the victims who suffered so cruelly on the ground from the attack itself and its aftermath' Robert Fox, author of We Were There

Dresden: The Fire and the Darkness

Europe

Penguin

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER Go behind the scenes of Bletchley Park, where everyday men and women risked everything for Queen and Country. A remarkable look at day-to-day life of the codebreakers whose clandestine efforts helped win World War II Bletchley Park looked like any other sprawling country estate. In reality, however, it was the top-secret headquarters of Britain’s Government Code and Cypher School—and the site where Germany’s legendary Enigma code was finally cracked. There, the nation’s most brilliant mathematical minds—including Alan Turing, whose discoveries at Bletchley would fuel the birth of modern computing—toiled alongside debutantes, factory workers, and students on projects of international importance. Until now, little has been revealed about ordinary life at this extraordinary facility. Drawing on remarkable first-hand interviews, The Secret Lives of Codebreakers reveals the entertainments, pastimes, and furtive romances that helped ease the incredible pressures faced by these covert operatives as they worked to turn the tide of World War II.

The Secret Lives of Codebreakers: The Men and Women Who Cracked the Enigma Code at Bletchley Park

Plume

Someone must have known what happened to Matilda Hacker. For someone in that house had killed her. So how could the murderer prove so elusive?&nbsp; Standing four storeys tall in an elegant Bloomsbury terrace, No. 4, Euston Square was a well-kept, respectable boarding house. But beneath this genteel Victorian London veneer lay murderous intrigue. On 9 May 1879, the body of a former resident, Matilda Hacker, was discovered by chance in the coal cellar. The ensuing investigation - led by Inspector Charles Hagen, rising star of the recently formed CID - stripped bare the dark side of Victorian domesticity. In this true-crime story, Sinclair McKay meticulously&nbsp;evaluates the evidence in first-hand sources. His gripping account sheds new light on a mystery&nbsp;that eluded Scotland Yard. 'With the gusto of a penny dreadful, Murder at No. 4 Euston Road dodges any stodgy courtroom testimony that can weigh down true crime stories and sticks to the juicy details. It is hard to avoid the comparison with Kate Summerscale's The Suspicions of Mr Whicher&nbsp;and it has similar historical richness and plot twisting...' The Spectator &nbsp; 'Sinclair McKay is an accomplished and talented author with a rare skill...&nbsp;True crime fans and history buffs will enjoy this book, coming away with an enthralling true crime story and a new knowledge and understanding of Victorian London.' Crime Traveller &nbsp; 'Gripping, gothic and deeply poignant'&nbsp;Mail on Sunday &nbsp; 'A meticulously researched book'&nbsp; - Brian Viner, Daily Mail &nbsp; &nbsp;

Murder at No. 4 Euston Square: The Mystery of the Lady in the Cellar

Aurum Press

<div>Pit your wits against the brilliant minds of Scotland Yard and see if you have what it takes to solve dozens of the world's toughest crimes.</div> <div> </div> <div>"Scotland Yard" conjures up so much more than just London's Metropolitan Police. Since it opened its doors in 1829, Scotland Yard has been synonymous the world over with the highest level of detective work and famous for its ability to solve the most macabre of murders and catch the most audacious of thieves.</div> <div> </div> <div>The Scotland Yard Puzzle Book mines the history of this famous institution to recreate some of the most complex conundrums its detectives have ever faced. Armchair detectives can now try their hand and keen powers of observation and deduction to solve for themselves dozens of the most difficult and challenging cases.</div> <div> </div> <div>Activities include:</div> <div> <ul> <li>Anagrams and cryptograms</li> <li>Logic, linguistic, and mathematical puzzles</li> <li>Map puzzles</li> <li>Coded and visual puzzles</li> <li>Brainteasers</li> <li>Hidden messages</li> <li>And more (answers are provided in the back of the book)!</li> </ul> </div>

Scotland Yard Puzzle Book

Humor & Entertainment

Puzzles & Games

Black Dog Leventhal

A gripping work of narrative nonfiction recounting the history of the Dresden Bombing, one of the most devastating attacks of World War II.
On February 13th, 1945 at 10:03 PM, British bombers began one of the most devastating attacks of WWII: the bombing of Dresden. The first contingent killed people and destroyed buildings, roads, and other structures. The second rained down fire, turning the streets into a blast furnace, the shelters into ovens, and whipping up a molten hurricane in which the citizens of Dresden were burned, baked, or suffocated to death. 
Early the next day, American bombers finished off what was left. Sinclair McKay’s The Fire and the Darkness is a pulse-pounding work of history that looks at the life of the city in the days before the attack, tracks each moment of the bombing, and considers the long period of reconstruction and recovery. The Fire and the Darkness is powered by McKay’s reconstruction of this unthinkable terror from the points of view of the ordinary civilians: Margot Hille, an apprentice brewery worker; Gisela Reichelt, a ten-year-old schoolgirl; boys conscripted into the Hitler Youth; choristers of the Kreuzkirche choir; artists, shop assistants, and classical musicians, as well as the Nazi officials stationed there. 
What happened that night in Dresden was calculated annihilation in a war that was almost over. Sinclair McKay’s brilliant work takes a complex, human, view of this terrible night and its aftermath in a gripping book that will be remembered long after the last page is turned.

The Fire and the Darkness: The Bombing of Dresden, 1945

St.Martin's Press

Sinclair McKay's portrait of Berlin from 1919 forward explores the city's broad human history, from the end of the Great War to the Blockade, rise of the Wall, and beyond. Sinclair McKay's Berlin begins by taking readers back to 1919 when the city emerged from the shadows of the Great War to become an extraordinary by-word for modernity--in art, cinema, architecture, industry, science, and politics. He traces the city's history through the rise of Hitler and the Battle for Berlin which ended in the final conquest of the city in 1945. It was a key moment in modern world history, but beyond the global repercussions lay thousands of individual stories of agony. From the countless women who endured nightmare ordeals at the hands of the Soviet soldiers to the teenage boys fitted with steel helmets too big for their heads and guns too big for their hands, McKay thrusts readers into the human cataclysm that tore down the modernity of the streets and reduced what was once the most sophisticated city on earth to ruins. Amid the destruction, a collective instinct was also at work--a determination to restore not just the rhythms of urban life, but also its fierce creativity. In Berlin today, there is a growing and urgent recognition that the testimonies of the ordinary citizens from 1919 forward should be given more prominence. That the housewives, office clerks, factory workers, and exuberant teenagers who witnessed these years of terrifying--and for some, initially exhilarating--transformation should be heard. Today, the exciting, youthful Berlin we see is patterned with echoes that lean back into that terrible vortex. In this new history of Berlin, Sinclair McKay erases the lines between the generations of Berliners, making their voices heard again to create a compelling, living portrait of life in this city that lay at the center of the world.

Berlin: Life and Death in the City at the Center of the World

From the author of the Sunday Times bestseller The Secret Life of Bletchley Park When Churchill made one of the most inspiring speeches of the 20th century - 'we will fight them on the beaches' - he was giving thanks for the miracle of deliverance, the harrowing and breathless evacuation of over 338,000 troops from the beaches and harbour at Dunkirk. Churchill was determined it shouldn't be labelled a victory. He was already too late. Hours later, broadcaster JB Priestley was to call it 'an absurd English epic'. Those days of Dunkirk are still invoked now whenever the nation finds itself in any kind of crisis. But there is a wider story too that involves a very large number of civilians - from nurses to racing enthusiasts, trades union leaders to dance hall managers, novelists to seaside cafe owners. And even wider yet, a story that starts in September 1939: of young civilian men being trained for a war that was already 25 years out of date; and the increasing suspense - and occasional surrealism - of the Phoney War. The 'absurd epic' of Dunkirk - told here through fresh interviews with veterans, plus unseen letters and archival material - is the story of how an old - fashioned island was brutally forced into the modernity of World War Two.

Dunkirk: From Disaster to Deliverance - Testimonies of the Last Survivors

ReadHowYouWant

Do you fancy mastering morse code? Discovering whether your crossword hobby might have seen you recruited into the history books? Do you think you could have outsmarted an enigma machine? If so and you're a Bletchley Park history buff or a fan of the GCHQ Quiz Book, then this is the book for you. When scouring the land for top-level code breakers, the Bletchley Park recruiters left no stone unturned. As well as approaching the country's finest mathematicians, they cast their nets much wider, interviewing sixth-form music students who could read orchestral scores, chess masters, poets, linguists, hieroglyphics experts and high society debutantes fresh from finishing school. To assess these individuals they devised various ingenious mind-twisters - hidden codes, cryptic crosswords, secret languages, complex riddles - and it is puzzles such as these, together with the fascinating recruitment stories that surround them, that make up the backbone of this book. The code breakers of Bletchley

Bletchley Park Brainteasers: The World War II Codebreakers Who Beat the Enigma Machine--And More Than 100 Puzzles and Riddles That Inspired Them

Quercus

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