Douglas Lowenthal

After The Devil in the White City and Dead awake, I was disappointed by The Splendid and the Vile. The Splendid turns out to be a concoction of personal vignettes, though Churchill was an interesting character. I got no appreciation for the Battle of Britain other than were it not for Hitler’s bad decision to invade Russia, Britain would have been destroyed by the Luftwaffe. The Vile received rather short shrift. The extent of their vileness was not captured in the book. The allied victory also received very little attention. Had the US not joined the war when it did, Britain would have been finished. Unlike Larson’s other books, which were captivating, this reads more like a sometimes amusing, sometimes sad, but also an inspiring memoir.