can you recommend a book about the end of world war one
There are SO many that it kind of depends on what exactly you're interested in reading about: the story of the Armistice and actual end of the war; the negotiations that led to the Treaty of Versailles; an overview of how the world tried to start putting itself back together (and how so much of that "reconstruction" ended up leading to World War II less than 20 years later and many of the conflicts around the world since 1918), and so on. I'll try to give you a suggestion for each of those aspects of the end of the First World War.
Eleventh Month, Eleventh Day, Eleventh Hour: Armistice Day, 1918: World War I and Its Violent Climax by Joseph E. Persico (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) is an excellent look at the military aspect of the end of the war.
Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World by Margaret MacMillan (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) is probably the best book about the diplomatic negotiations following the end of the war which, among other things, led to the Treaty of Versailles, carved new boundaries and created new territories in vast parts of the world which led to decades of conflicts that are still being fought today, punished Germany so harshly that it led to the rise of Hitler and the Nazis, and much more.
The Vanquished: Why the First World War Failed to End by Robert Gerwarth (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) is the story of the brutal consequences of the war and diplomatic blunders of the victors which ultimately resulted in scores of governments falling, empires collapsing, dynasties going extinct, economic chaos -- and the aftermath of those disasters.
But my highest recommendation is Charles Emmerson's book Crucible: The Long End of the Great War and the Birth of a New World, 1917-1924 (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO), which was published in 2019 and is, without a doubt, the absolute best book I've read in the past 10 years. It's on the short-list of best books I've EVER read. Crucible touches on all the aspects of the end of the war that I mentioned, but does so through the stories of individual people -- mostly notable people, but in a much different manner than normal biographies or history books. It's actually kind of hard to explain the book because it's so original in the amazing way that Emmerson writes, but I don't simply recommend Crucible for someone wanting to read about the end of World War I; I think everyone should check it out. I give a lot of book suggestions, but I don't exaggerate when it comes to praising a book to this extent. It's remarkable and as I've said before, I'm always frustrated that I can't read it for the first time all over again.
