Wilful Murder: The Sinking Of The Lusitania
  • Published: 15 April 2015
  • ISBN: 9780857522931
  • Imprint: Doubleday
  • Format: Trade Paperback
  • Pages: 544
  • RRP: $45.00
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Wilful Murder: The Sinking Of The Lusitania

Formats & editions
EBook
15 Feb 2011
Paperback
15 Feb 2011
Tr. Paperback
15 Apr 2015
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With a revised and updated foreword, this comprehensive special centenary edition explores the tragedy of the sinking of the Lusitania in May 1915.

On May 7th, 1915 a passenger ship crossing the Atlantic sank with the loss of 1200 lives. On board were some world-famous figures, including multimillionaire Alfred Vanderbilt. But this wasn't the Titanic and there was no iceberg. The liner was the Lusitania and it was torpedoed by a German U-boat.

Wilful Murder is the hugely compelling story of the sinking of the Lusitania. The first book to look at the events in their full historical context, it is also the first to place the human dimension at its heart. Using first-hand accounts of the tragedy Diana Preston brings the characters to life, recreating the splendour of the liner as it set sail and the horror of its final moments. Using British, American and German research material she answers many of the unanswered and controversial questions surrounding the Lusitania: why didn't Cunard listen to warnings that the ship would be a target of the Germans? Was the Lusitania sacrificed to bring the Americans into the War? What was really in the Lusitania's hold? Was she armed? Had Cunard's offices been infiltrated by German agents? And did the Kaiser's decision to cease unrestricted U-boat warfare in response to international outrage expressed after the sinking effectively change the outcome of the First World War?

Highly readable, meticulously researched, this special centenary edition casts dramatic new light on one of the world's most famous maritime disasters.
  • Published: 15 April 2015
  • ISBN: 9780857522931
  • Imprint: Doubleday
  • Format: Trade Paperback
  • Pages: 544
  • RRP: $45.00
Categories:
Share…

About the author

Diana Preston

Diana Preston is an Oxford-trained historian, writer, and broadcaster who lives in London. Her most recent books are Wilful Murder: The Sinking of the Lusitania (now a major BBC1 film), A Pirate of Exquisite Mind, Before the Fall-Out (chosen for the Samuel Johnson Prize longlist), A Teardrop on the Cheek of Time and Cleopatra and Antony.

Also by Diana Preston

Cleopatra and Antony
A Teardrop on the Cheek of Time
Before the Fall-Out
A Pirate Of Exquisite Mind
See all

Praise for Wilful Murder: The Sinking Of The Lusitania

'The most comprehensive and accessible account of the sinking there has been or perhaps will be'

Alan Judd, Sunday Telegraph

'Sets a standard which other books have not achieved'

Irish Independent

'A fitting monument to a multiudinous loss'

John Updike, New Yorker

'It is not easy, nowadays, to write an original book on the first world war...but Preston has succeeded'

Norman Stone, The Sunday Times

'A book as majestic as its subject.  Preston is a consumate popular historian and a stylish and elegant writer'

Chicago Sun-Times

'A complex story of heroism and great courage'

Independent on Sunday

'Clear and effective...benefits from exhaustive research'

The Times Literary Supplement

'Very good...Preston has done an extraordinary amount of work, particularly in tracing the memories of survivors'

The Sunday Times
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