Thunderstruck
buy bestselling books in print, audio books
|
 |
List Price: $44.95
Our Price:
$29.67
You Save: $15.28
Features
• Audiobook
• Unabridged |
| [ + Zoom ] [ Buy Now ] |
Book : Usually ships in 24 hours |
|
Thunderstruck Customer Reviews
|
|
|
|
♥♥♥♥♥ |
Crime and technology collide as century turns
|
With his previous book, DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY, Erik Larson minted a fresh way of telling history: weaving together a well-known event in American social history with a now forgotten tale of true crime from the same era in such a way that both strands reflect and reveal much about one another. In that book, it was the creation and exhibition of the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, a celebration of the Industrial Age and the technology age that would become the 20th century and a serial killer on the loose, preying on fair-goers. In his new book, THUNDERSTRUCK, it's not so much a weaving together as it is a collision between Guglielmo Marconi pushing for the world acceptance of his wireless technology and an international manhunt for a murderer.
The first thing you should know is, this is highly readable stuff. Larson has done significant research with the chapter notes and bibliography to prove it but his text reads with the ease of a well-tuned novel. The second thing you should know is, that for at least three-quarters of the book, you are left thinking, but how are these two stories ever going to pull together, except for what each reveals about the late 19th and very early 20th centuries? Larson leap-frogs the story strands at a head-turning pace but they are out of kilter, with the crime tale gaining time on the technology story. That said, when one catches up with the other, there is a big payoff, not only for the London police but for the driven Marconi as well.
Larson manages to make the story of an engineer and his technological invention interesting. He fully realizes the cast of characters. He invites wonder as he trots out details, like Marconi's competitor Nikola Tesla using the word "television" in 1900. The London forensics team of 1910 makes as much of technology with similar results as today's television crime scene investigators. It is the use of the wireless telegraph by ships at sea, however, to snare the unsuspecting murderer while the world listens in that is truly amazing.
|
|
Thunderstruck Books In Print, Audio Books.