Diana Preston’s Followers (116)

Diana Preston

Born

London, The United Kingdom

Genre

History

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Born and raised in London, Diana Preston studied Modern History at Oxford University, where she first became involved in journalism. After earning her degree, she became a freelance writer of feature and travel articles for national UK newspapers and magazines and has subsequently reviewed books for a number of publications, including The Wall Street Journal and The Los Angeles Times. She has also been a broadcaster for the BBC and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and has been featured in various television documentaries.

Eight years ago, her decision to write "popular" history led her to The Road to Culloden Moor: Bonnie Prince Charlie and the '45 Rebellion (Constable UK, 1995). It was followed by A First Rate Tragedy: Robert Falcon
Born and raised in London, Diana Preston studied Modern History at Oxford University, where she first became involved in journalism. After earning her degree, she became a freelance writer of feature and travel articles for national UK newspapers and magazines and has subsequently reviewed books for a number of publications, including The Wall Street Journal and The Los Angeles Times. She has also been a broadcaster for the BBC and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and has been featured in various television documentaries.

Eight years ago, her decision to write "popular" history led her to The Road to Culloden Moor: Bonnie Prince Charlie and the '45 Rebellion (Constable UK, 1995). It was followed by A First Rate Tragedy: Robert Falcon Scott and the Race to the South Pole (Houghton Mifflin, 1998), The Boxer Rebellion (Walker & Company, 2000), Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy (Walker & Company, 2002) and now, Before The Fallout: From Marie Curie to Hiroshima.

In choosing her topics, Preston looks for stories and events which are both compelling in their own right and also help readers gain a wider understanding of the past. She is fascinated by the human experience-what motivates people to think and act as they do‹and the individual stories that comprise the larger historical picture. Preston spent over two years researching Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy. She did a remarkable amount of original research for the book, and is the first author to make full use of the German archives and newly discovered papers that illuminate both the human tragedy and subsequent plots to cover up what really happened. Preston traveled to all the key locations of the tragedy, experiencing firsthand how cold the water off the Irish coast near Cobh would have been in early May when the Lusitania sank, and how eerie it was to stand inside what remains of the U-20 (now at the Strandingsmuseum in West Jutland, Denmark) where the U-boat captain watched the Lusitania through his periscope and gave the order to fire. Of the many artifacts she reviewed, it was her extensive reading of the diaries and memoirs of survivors that had the biggest impact on her. The experience of looking at photographs and touching the scraps of clothing of both survivors and those who died when the Lusitania sank provided her with chilling pictures: The heartbreaking image of a young girl whose sister's hand slipped away from her was one that kept Preston up at night.

When not writing, Preston is an avid traveler with her husband, Michael. Together, they have sojourned throughout India, Asia, Africa, and Antarctica, and have climbed Mount Kinabalu in Borneo, Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and Mount Roraima in Venezuela. Their adventures have also included gorilla-tracking in Zaire and camping their way across the Namibian desert.

Diana and Michael Preston live in London, England.

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Diana Preston’s books

Average rating: 4.03 · 6,407 ratings · 742 reviews · 42 distinct works • Similar authors

	A Pirate of Exquisite Mind: Explorer, Naturalist, and Buccaneer: The Life of William Dampier by Diana Preston, Michael Preston 4.09 avg rating — 1,279 ratings — published 2004 — 20 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Cleopatra and Antony: Power, Love, and Politics in the Ancient World 4.05 avg rating — 874 ratings — published 2008 — 20 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy 4.03 avg rating — 875 ratings — published 2002 — 30 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Boxer Rebellion: The Dramatic Story of China's War on Foreigners that Shook the World in the Summer of 1900 3.79 avg rating — 734 ratings — published 1999 — 11 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Taj Mahal: A Love Affair at the Heart of the Moghul Empire 3.90 avg rating — 674 ratings — published 2006 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Eight Days at Yalta: How Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin Shaped the Post-War World 4.20 avg rating — 481 ratings — published 2020 — 13 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Before the Fallout: From Marie Curie to Hiroshima 4.28 avg rating — 337 ratings — published 2005 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	A First Rate Tragedy: Robert Falcon Scott and the Race to the South Pole 4.08 avg rating — 341 ratings — published 1997 — 24 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Road to Culloden Moor: Bonnie Prince Charlie and the '45 Rebellion 4.14 avg rating — 223 ratings — published 1996 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Evolution of Charles Darwin: The Epic Voyage of the Beagle That Forever Changed Our View of Life on Earth 4.19 avg rating — 219 ratings — published 2022 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Quotes by Diana Preston (?)

“Mike Reilly had noted, while making security checks on peasant huts near the Livadia, that ‘every house, no matter how poverty-ridden, had a radio . . . They were odd-looking radios to these American eyes, as they had no knobs or dialling apparatus of any kind. It seemed that they were built to receive only one frequency, which was that of the powerful Moscow government-controlled station.”
― Diana Preston, Eight Days at Yalta: How Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin Shaped the Post-war World

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“Churchill was so overweight that in 1942 he had to have a new desk installed in his Cabinet war rooms beneath London’s Whitehall because he could not fit behind the previous one.”
― Diana Preston, Eight Days at Yalta: How Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin Shaped the Post-war World

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“His inaugural address was the briefest in US history – less than 600 words – and his message simple: the people of America were ‘passing through a period of supreme test’ during which they had learned ‘to live as men and not as ostriches’ and to be ‘citizens of the world’. He promised that, ‘In the days and the years that are to come, we shall work for a just and honorable peace, a durable peace, as today we work and fight for total victory in war.”
― Diana Preston, Eight Days at Yalta: How Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin Shaped the Post-war World

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Polls

Vote for a work of non-fiction for us to read and discuss in May 2014

Tuxedo Park: A Wall Street Tycoon and the Secret Palace of Science That Changed the Course of World War II by Jennet Conant

6 votes, 42.9%

Gandhi, An Autobiography - The Story of My Experiments With Truth by Mahatma Gandhi

5 votes, 35.7%

Diana Mosley by Anne de Courcy

1 vote, 7.1%

Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy by Diana Preston

1 vote, 7.1%

The Fatal Englishman: Three Short Lives by Sebastian Faulks

1 vote, 7.1%

The Long Shadow: The Great War and the Twentieth Century by David Reynolds

0 votes, 0.0%

The Mad Sculptor by Harold Schechter

0 votes, 0.0%

14 total votes

11 comments

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Topics Mentioning This Author

topics	posts	views	last activity
Reading with Style: Fall 2012 Rws Completed Tasks - Fall 2012	1067	199	Dec 02, 2012 10:09AM
The History Book ...: ARCHIVE ONE: PLEASE INTRODUCE YOURSELF ~	6553	4405	May 08, 2013 03:33PM
The Seasonal Read...: Summer Challenge 2013: Completed Tasks (DO NOT DELETE POSTS)	2503	772	Aug 31, 2013 09:04PM
The History Book ...: THE BOXER REBELLION	14	231	Nov 07, 2014 01:51PM
Bright Young Things: May 2015- The Lusitania Story by Mitch Peeke	86	17	May 09, 2015 06:08AM
The History Book ...: ARCHIVE - CLEOPATRA - GLOSSARY - Spoiler Thread	44	113	May 25, 2015 10:18AM
The History Book ...: ARCHIVE TWO: PLEASE INTRODUCE YOURSELF ~	6144	5124	Sep 19, 2015 03:18AM
Pick-a-Shelf: * February - River	77	28	Dec 30, 2016 06:37AM

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Diana Preston’s Followers (116)

Diana Preston

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