I preferred Devil in the White City. Nevertheless, Larson maintains the reader's interest with his formula of brief chapters that alternate between characters. Once again, he makes an episode in history come to life through his detailed research and simple prose. ( )
Crippen murder parts - very interesting. Marconi parts - I wanted to like them, I really did. An interesting subject, elaborated upon in a very, very dry way at a snail's pace. Didn't feel that the ship was a strong enough connection between the two intersecting stories. I wasn't sure the juxtaposition worked as a whole. By the middle of the book, I was skimming the Marconi parts hastily and reading every single word of the Crippen case chapters. ( )
As always Larsen's books are gems of information. He brings to life both Marconi, and Crippen as he opens a window into the world of Edwardian England. I was a little disappointed not to learn the long term fate of his wireless company. ( )
A safe but sometimes chilly way of recalling the past is to force open a crammed drawer. If you are searching for anything in particular you don't find it, but something falls out at the back that is often more interesting.
J.M. Barrie "Dedication" Peter Pan 1904
Dedication
For my wife and daughters, and in memory of my mother, who first told me about Crippen.
First words
On Wednesday, July 20, 1910, as a light fog drifted along the River Scheldt, Capt. Henry George Kendall prepares his ship, the SS Montrose, for what should have been the most routine of voyages, from Antwerp direct to Quebec City, Canada.
A true story of love, murder, and the end of the world’s “great hush”
In Thunderstruck, Erik Larson tells the interwoven stories of two men—Hawley Crippen, a very unlikely murderer, and Guglielmo Marconi, the obsessive creator of a seemingly supernatural means of communication—whose lives intersect during one of the greatest criminal chases of all time.
Set in Edwardian London and on the stormy coasts of Cornwall, Cape Cod, and Nova Scotia, Thunderstruck evokes the dynamism of those years when great shipping companies competed to build the biggest, fastest ocean liners, scientific advances dazzled the public with visions of a world transformed, and the rich outdid one another with ostentatious displays of wealth. Against this background, Marconi races against incredible odds and relentless skepticism to perfect his invention: the wireless, a prime catalyst for the emergence of the world we know today. Meanwhile, Crippen, “the kindest of men,” nearly commits the perfect crime.
With his superb narrative skills, Erik Larson guides these parallel narratives toward a relentlessly suspenseful meeting on the waters of the North Atlantic. Along the way, he tells of a sad and tragic love affair that was described on the front pages of newspapers around the world, a chief inspector who found himself strangely sympathetic to the killer and his lover, and a driven and compelling inventor who transformed the way we communicate. Thunderstruck presents a vibrant portrait of an era of séances, science, and fog, inhabited by inventors, magicians, and Scotland Yard detectives, all presided over by the amiable and fun-loving Edward VII as the world slid inevitably toward the first great war of the twentieth century. Gripping from the first page, and rich with fascinating detail about the time, the people, and the new inventions that connect and divide us, Thunderstruck is splendid narrative history from a master of the form.
From the Hardcover edition.
(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:57:52 -0400)
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Wikipedia in English (2)
