THE LAST HUNDRED DAYS

by John Toland ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

Perhaps no other 100 days in history,"" says the author in the brief note serving as a preface to this gigantic undertaking, ""have had greater significance and consequences than those at the end of World War II in Europe."" It is not an entirely implausible claim, and this book does all that one volume could to establish it. As with his Battle: The Story of the Bulge (1959), the author bases his book on hundreds of interviews with participants from 21 countries as well as thousands of primary sources (many of them previously unavailable; yet it reads with a drive that his wide research does not lessen. Mr. Toland Jumps from theatre to theatre, from GI to der Fuehrer in his bunker to partisans gunning down Il Duce to Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt at Yalta, and back around again until the final meeting of uneasy allies in the rubble of Berlin. One searches in vain for a single generality; all one finds are gripping particulars. There is not one supposition or fabrication, either; scene and dialogue and action pass quickly. The author says he has ""tried to write of those portentous days as if they took place 100 years ago,"" and yet they seem to happen before the reader's eyes. The Is Paris Burning? market should be the one to try.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1966

Categories: NONFICTION