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Oct 13, 2011

Jeanette rated it:

Be prepared to stay up reading into the wee hours once you get your hands on this book. It held my interest better than any novel, and it filled in all the gaps in my understanding of how Hitler was able to gain so much power so quickly, with so little opposition. Erik Larson used the detailed diaries of William E. Dodd and his daughter Martha to reconstruct "a year in the life" for Americans in Berlin from 1933 to 1934.

William Dodd had no idea what he was saying yes to whe More...

35 comments like (38 people liked it)

Nov 05, 2011

Corina rated it:

I didn't think you could make the rise of Hitler boring, but...this was. Ever so much. 300 pages of "But unknown to Dodd, all the rich dudes in the US hated him and were saying things like blah blah blah" and "Martha was having yet another affair" and "Everyone in Berlin seemed happy but THE ATMOSPHERE WAS TENSE" that all led up to a rather anticlimactic Night of the Long Knives. I really just didn't care for anyone in the Dodd family - Dodd himself seemed stuffy an More...

8 comments like (51 people liked it)

Jan 06, 2012

Lou rated it:

This story covers the Dodd family and their lives amongst the beast machine of Hitler's Nazi Germany. Rosevelt asked Dodd to become the American ambassador to Hitler's Germany. At that time Germany was in debt to America and owed loads of money and they looked like they were not going to pay so the need for the ambassador arose. Dodd and his wife agreed to the position and so they left for Berlin, he also invited his two grown children Martha and Bill. The lovely Martha appears in the story qui More...

6 comments like (26 people liked it)

Aug 03, 2011

Kemper rated it:

Picture Principal Skinner from The Simpsons and Paris Hilton going to Nazi Germany, and you’ll have a pretty good idea of what this book is like.

I was split on Erik Larson’s The Devil in the White City because I found the half of the book about the 1893 Chicago’s World Fair incredibly interesting but thought the other half about serial killer H.H. Holmes to be just another true crime gore fest. Then in Thunderstruck he again gave us some nice pop history with the story of Marconi an More...

8 comments like (49 people liked it)

Dec 21, 2011

Will rated it:

In 1933, William Dodd, a Chicago academic is appointed the first American ambassador to Hitler’s Germany. He enters this cauldron accompanied by his family, most particularly by his very modern daughter, Martha. Larson shows us the quickly changing Germany of 1933 through their eyes.

While this is hardly a man-on-the-strasse point of view, a look at the goings on through the experiences of a diplomat and his daughter does get a bit closer to the ground than a more removed historical More...

12 comments like (7 people liked it)

Aug 14, 2011

Kristine rated it:

UPDATE: OhMyHannah! I finally finished this flipping book. I really appreciated the information and content. As a 30 year old I can look back at the story of the Nazis and say, "What the?!! How could a whole international community even ALLOW this dynasty to begin?" This book will answer that question. The story is of William Dodd, a mild-mannered college professor who is appointed ambassador to Germany after basically everyone else refuses the job. He brings his wife, his coll More...

5 comments like (8 people liked it)

Jan 08, 2012

Lucy rated it:

Wow, In the Garden of Beasts is quite the addictive read, I had it done in almost one sitting and only put it aside because I needed sleep before work. If I had started it on a night where I had the next day off, I'm pretty sure I would have pushed sleepiness aside so I could finish it in one long, intriguing session. So be forwarded, its possible you're not gonna want to put this one down.

It really is amazing to find out that if the American government had listened to the warnings o More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

May 11, 2011

Lyn M rated it:

This is the newest book by the author who wrote The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America. If you are a history aficionado like me, especially if you are intrigued by Germany during the time of the Third Reich, then this is the book for you. Through the eyes of the American ambassador to Berlin and his adult daughter, Mr. Larson shows in stunning fashion how the world was determined to ignore the warning signs, and thus the true intent of Hitler and More...

2 comments like (15 people liked it)

Dec 07, 2011

Anne rated it:

2 1/2 stars "It was okay." That's what two stars mean. IMO, this book is over-hyped. It has some interesting parts, like a bit of an inside view of events and people, both German and American officials and citizens. We see through their eyes how Hitler was able to take more and more power over Germany. There are parts that are interesting, like several appearances of the Jewish Bella Fromm, a popular society journalist of the day ( who seemed to breathe so intelligence and More...

36 comments like (6 people liked it)

Sep 14, 2011

Elizabeth rated it:

My friend MM said it all when she said she thought she had read all she wanted to read about Nazi Germany but the Larson is such a great storyteller that she liked the book. It is told through the stories of William Dodd who was FDR's appointment as Ambassador to Germany in 1932 and his attractive, romantic, unconventional daughter who saw herself as a writer and observer of the political scene. Martha slept with the head of the Gestapo, French attaches and a Russian undersecretary (and many ot More...

3 comments like (5 people liked it)

Oct 17, 2011

Helen rated it:

A completely riveting book, dealing mostly with one pivotal year, 1933, during the last few ticks of the clock before Hitler seized total power in Germany. Larson parses every faction of the Nazi Party; every evil personality, every evil viewpoint, every indefensible position, in clear, breathlessly thrilling prose.

Roosevelt selects a new Ambassador to Germany, William E. Dodd. As he later finds out, he's not the President's first choice, or his second, or his third. No one wants the More...

6 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jul 07, 2011

Emily rated it:

I guess I could call this a group biography of William Dodd, a mild-mannered Midwestern professor who became US Ambassador to Germany in 1933, and his daughter Martha Dodd, a female playboy who quickly became infatuated with the glamour of Berlin nightlife. It makes for a readable story as well as a discussion of international attitudes (and blindspots) towards the Nazis as they consolidated power. Martha's memoir seems to have been particularly revealing in regard to her initial fascination wit More...

3 comments like (8 people liked it)

Jan 17, 2012

Thomas rated it:

A deeply insightful book on the lives of an American ambassador and his family during the early years of Third Reich.

The book is in its entirety of a somber and menacing atmosphere, as attested in the author Larson's choice of chapter titles such as "Lucifer's Run", "Premonition", and "Gardens in the Dark", inter alia. Which is totally understandable, given the reality that almost everyone holding political office in the diplomatic community were under t More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 23, 2011

Ron rated it:

A wonderfully rich and detailed book of the early years of the Nazi party's take-over of Germany in 1933 and 1934. This is a non-fiction book but it is just as exciting as any potboiler thriller. The book is so interesting that you'll happily even read the end notes and bibliography. Its the story of U.S. Ambassador to Germany, William Dodd and his family. Dodd served from 1933 to 1937 - a time in Germany that saw the rise of Hitler and the Nazi party. Dodd may have been a little slow in recog More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Nov 11, 2011

Steven rated it:

Here's a travel log for you--a penny-pinching southern college professor and his promiscuous daughter take a tour of Europe. Sounds like a plot for a movie by National Lampoon--maybe, European Vacation. This time, though, the comedy is missing.

Our penny-pinching professor is William Dodd, the man President Franklin Roosevelt sent as our ambassador to Germany in 1933.

In the Garden of Beasts tells the story of a principled man and his infamously horny daughter in a time of More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

May 01, 2011

Suzanne rated it:

"I have always wondered what it would have been like for an outsider to have witnessed firsthand the gathering dark of Hitler's rule. How did the city look, what did one hear, see, and smell, and how did diplomats and other visitors interpret the events occurring around them?"

With his latest work of non-fiction, author Erik Larson takes us inside Berlin in the year 1933, to experience Hitler's rise to power from the point of view of two American protagonists. The firs More...

3 comments like (4 people liked it)

May 26, 2011

Ashley rated it:

I wasn't expecting to enjoy this book as much as I did. I'd had some conceptual problems with Larson's previous book The Devil in the White City. I felt he'd found three really interesting stories that happened to occur during the same time and in the same place, but which were otherwise unrelated, and had smooshed them together. Smooshing things together was never an issue with In the Garden of Beasts, which is one of those rare historical books that have the tension and atmosphere of a novel. More...

5 comments like (4 people liked it)

Nov 25, 2011

Abby rated it:

Erik Larson writes an effective, if plodding, bestseller that one can bring to the beach while still pretending to be reading something highbrow and noble (it's based on actual historical documents, after all). Larson's book follows the US Ambassador to Germany (William Dodd) and his family as they navigate life in Berlin during the rise of Hitler.

Ambassador Dodd is an idealistic history professor and a Jeffersonian Democrat who believes that those who do not understand history are More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Sep 20, 2011

Lauren rated it:

A story about an American family - particularly studied through the eyes of the father and the grown daughter - who were "thrust" into diplomatic service and had the unique front-row seat to the rise of National Socialism and the formation of the Third Reich in the early 1930s.

As American ambassadors, they entertained Nazis at the US Embassy, and even in their own home. Martha, the daughter, had relationships with Nazis (including a high-ranking leader of the Gestapo). More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Feb 13, 2012

Nikki rated it:

Wow is all I have to say. No matter how many times I read books that focus on the actions -- or non-actions -- taken prior to the start of WWII, it never fails to amaze me. That the world can be filled with such madness, indifference and prejudice is something that I find very scary.

What's interesting to me about this book in particular is that even though it sounds as if Ambassador Dodd changed his tune in the final months of his ambassadorship, that even he, an American living in Ger More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Aug 10, 2011

Pamela rated it:

Honestly, I love Erik Larson's writing style, but this was clearly not his strongest work. He kept me reading, and I finished, but it was slow moving. The topic itself made me want to pick this book up, WWII fascinates me, but the story was just not that captivating. I felt it could have been narrowed down to an even shorter book. It was interesting how he uncovered how smoothly Hitler worked his way into power, but the Dodd family was not as interesting. I did find Dodd himself an interesting c More...

1 comment like (4 people liked it)

Dec 29, 2011

Laura rated it:

Larson's topic, exploring what life was like in Berlin during the first years of Hitler's regime, as seen through the eyes of the American Ambassador, William Dodd, and his family, doesn't exactly break new ground but it does highlight how the world was sure that Hitler was not a huge threat and would be reasonable.

Dodd doesn't exactly fit in with what the majority of foreign service members thought service meant: he was frugal, an academic, and more interested in pursuing the writin More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Nov 17, 2011

Julie rated it:

Larson’s skill at narrating non-fiction is unparalleled and the topic of his latest book is extremely intriguing. He makes history accessible and entertaining. This book follows the Dodd family to Hitler’s Berlin in 1933 when patriarch William is granted the post of US Ambassador. The early days of Hitler’s reign is a tumultuous time in the country’s history and the narrative is laced with a sense of trepidation. During Dodd’s 4-year stint as ambassador, he encounters various diplomats, fore More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

May 10, 2011

Barb rated it:

I loved Erik Larson's 'The Devil in the White City', I found the subject matter fascinating and the writing fabulous. 'In the Garden of Beasts' is the second book I've read by Larson and I'm sorry to say the two don't compare.

I've read a fair number of books about the Holocaust and I did find the political maneuvering described in 'Garden' interesting in a stomach turning, sickening kind of way. But the people in this story never came to life for me, with the exception of Martha Do More...

0 comments like (19 people liked it)

Jun 26, 2011

ML rated it:

Thought I'd read everything I needed to read about Nazi Germany but this is written by Erik Larson and he is a very good storyteller. We always wonder how it was that the world was so slow to understand. FDR appointed a history professor from the Univ of Chicago as Ambassador to Germany in 1933. The ambassador was naive but his eventual understanding of the Hitler regime was lost on the State Dept. We are entertained by ambassador's daughter who slept her way through Nazis, Russians, Germans - More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

May 24, 2011

Nathan rated it:

A fascinating book that puts the reader on the "ground level" of Hitler's early years in Germany, told from the perspective of the U.S. Ambassador to Germany and his family. The narrative moves forward almost like a horror movie - you know the killer's in the basement and you want to warn the hero of the danger, but in the end, you know it won't matter. I highly recommend this book by the author of Devil in the White City, Isaac's Storm, and Thunderstruck.

2 comments like (3 people liked it)

Nov 05, 2011

Deborah rated it:

Wow, this book puts Hannah Arendt's notion of the banality of evil in a whole other context for me. Evil inches into ordinary Germans' lives as the Nazis ask a little more obedience, a little more irrationality, a little more ground of them every day until they've actually taken over the government. Amazing how something like the Heil Hitler salute being required at every encounter could create so much background noise of paranoia that people lost the ability to take action against the take over More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Jun 06, 2011

Heather rated it:

The very interesting story of Hitler's rise to power. Larson is such a talented writer that he can make even the most seemingly mundane meeting between officials come to life. William E. Dodd, American ambassador to Germany in the 4 years prior to WWII, was an intelligent and insightful man (except when it came to his daughter) but not charismatic or forceful enough to make his bosses back at home open their eyes to what was really happening in Germany. Recommend it to anyone interested in thi More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Jan 17, 2012

Barb rated it:

This is a really interesting perspective on the rise of Nazi Germany. If you ever wondered what Germany was like just before WWII, this book gives you an uniquely American view of the life and politics of Hitler's Germany as it documents the experiences of an American diplomatic family that is posted to Germany in 1938.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 20, 2011

Brenda rated it:

Engrossing, nonfiction book about the rise of the Nazi regime, as reconstructed from notes and diaries of the American ambassador to Germany (and his family) in the 1930s. A very good read - highly recommend if you are interested in this period of history.

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

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