Inferno

The Devastation of Hamburg, 1943

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Summary

In the last days of July 1943, British and American planes dropped 9,000 tons of bombs with the intention of erasing the German city from the map. The resultant firestorm burned for a month and left 40,000 civilians dead.

Inferno is a searing account of terrifying destruction: of how and why the Allies dropped a hail of high-explosive and incendiary bombs; of blizzards of sparks, hurricane-force winds and 800-degree temperatures; of survivors cowering in basements or struggling along melting streets; of a city and its people near annihilated from above.

Inferno is an epic story of human devastation and survival against impossible odds.

Reviews

A real triumph: shocking, yet sensitive and supremely fair-minded. This is a wonderful book about hellish events.

Richard Holmes

About the author

Keith Lowe

Keith Lowe is widely recognized as a leading authority on the Second World War. He is the author of Inferno: The Devastation of Hamburg, 1943 and Savage Continent, which was a Sunday Times top ten bestseller and won the PEN Hessell-Tiltman Prize. He has spoken often on television and radio, both in Britain and the United States, and his books have been translated into 20 languages. He lives in north London with his wife and two children.

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