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The cover of The Splendid and the Vile

The Splendid and the Vile

Erik Larson, 2020

Follow Winston Churchill's first year as prime minister, when Britain stood alone against the Blitz, and see how ordinary courage and calculated defiance carried a nation through nightly bombing.

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20 parts, about 32 minutes to read.

Why read it

  • Follows the Battle of Britain and the Blitz as the prime minister and his circle lived them, from Dunkirk to the raids on London
  • Shows the household side of power: a daughter's diary, a son's debts, an aide's secret diary and a wife's warnings
  • Traces how Britain courted American help, from old destroyers traded for bases to the garden hose idea behind Lend Lease

Who it is for

  • Readers of World War Two history who like narrative
  • Fans of diaries and intimate portraits of leaders
  • Readers curious how Britain endured nightly bombing

What the summary covers

  1. Waiting for the Bombers1 min
  2. Churchill Takes Power3 min
  3. Dunkirk1 min
  4. The Secret Beams1 min
  5. Britain Alone2 min
  6. Firing on an Ally1 min
  7. Hitler Weighs Invasion2 min
  8. Eagle Day2 min
  9. Bombs on Two Capitals1 min
  10. The Blitz Begins2 min
  11. Battle of Britain Day1 min
  12. Mines, Dakar and a Grandson2 min
  13. Moonlight Sonata1 min
  14. The Garden Hose2 min
  15. Hopkins in Britain2 min
  16. A Bomb on the Dance Floor2 min
  17. Debts and Allies1 min
  18. Bombs and a Vote2 min
  19. Hess Falls from the Sky2 min
  20. The Same Boat1 min

Recommended by

  • Candice MillardAmerican author and former National Geographic writer and editor
    Through the remarkably skillful use of intimate diaries as well as public documents, some newly released, Larson has transformed the well-known record of 12 turbulent months, stretching from May of 1940 through May of 1941, into a book that is fresh, fast and deeply moving.
  • Chris MatthewsFormer host of MSNBC's Hardball and author
    The Splendid and the Vile delivers the great saga with a novelist’s touch. It’s like you’re watching and hearing the days and nights of 1940 as a passenger on a double-decker London bus.
  • Andrew RobertsBritish historian and author of Churchill: Walking with Destiny
    The popular historian Erik Larson has done it again. As I read this book, I kept wondering what the swelling of powerful emotion was that I felt, sometimes in an almost physical sense.

About the author

  • Erik LarsonAmerican author of mostly historical nonfiction
    • Born in Brooklyn and raised in Freeport, Long Island, New York.
    • Graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied Russian history, language and culture, and earned a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University.
    • Worked at the Bucks County Courier Times for two years, then became a staff writer for The Wall Street Journal and later a contributing writer for Time magazine.
    • His magazine stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly and Harper's.
    • Has taught nonfiction writing at San Francisco State, the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars and the University of Oregon.
    • The Devil in the White City was a National Book Award finalist and won an Edgar Award for fact crime writing.
    • His first narrative nonfiction book, Isaac's Storm, won the American Meteorological Society's Louis J. Battan Author's Award, and he won the Chicago Public Library Foundation's 2016 Carl Sandburg Literary Award for Nonfiction.
    • His seven national bestsellers have collectively sold more than twelve million copies and have been published in nearly forty countries.

Read it alongside

  • Goes deeperFreedom’s Forge

    Larson follows Churchill's effort to secure indispensable American supplies. Herman explains how government advances and contracts shifted conversion risk so private firms could build the specialized plants and tools needed to deliver them.

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