Europe, June–August 1914
Sarajevo, 1914
One wrong turn by a driver, and the machinery of alliances did the rest.
what's actually going on
No great power wanted the war they all got. A murder in Sarajevo fed through mobilisation timetables, alliance obligations and the universal certainty of being home by Christmas — and four empires fell. It is the permanent case study in how systems escalate when every actor behaves 'rationally', and it is what analysts are actually thinking about when they war-game Taiwan straits and Arctic incidents today.
the books that prove it
- All Quiet on the Western Front20M+ copies, the interwar mega-seller
- Birdsongthe modern WW1 standard
- War Horsestage and screen phenomenon
The Franz Ferdinand story double-charted in history podcasting's most-listened rankings.
more through this doorway
- Fall of Giants
- The Alice Network
- Regeneration
- The Eye in the Door
- The Ghost Road
- A Farewell to Arms
- The Absolutist
- Wake
- The Daughters of Mars
- Goodbye to All That
From the catalogue — matched on this period's subjects.
The scroll for this doorway isn't written yet — the books above are the way in.
Doorways with a scroll