In his new book, Erik Larson uses a similar approach to that in his previous book The Devil in the White City, juxtaposing a momentous historical event with a lesser-known but fascinating crime. In Thunderstruck, Larson uses Marconi's perfection of the wireless alongside a "perfect" murder committed by a man named Hawley Crippen, successfully illustrating an era that was seeing tremendous gains in technology as it headed toward the First World War. Because of the use of Marconi's wireless, Crippen is ultimately caught, but most of the book is spent in showing how the wireless was invented and how the lives of these two men, alive during the same time but very different in temperament and circumstances, intersected. By using Crippen's story along with Marconi's invention, Larson makes this point in history more accessible and brings the reader inside the time and place in a way that a straightforward narrative about the wireless alone could never do.
As with his previous books, Larson is a master of incorporating rich details. He describes both the birth of the wireless and the circumstances of poor Mr. Crippen's unhappy marriage, how he finds his true love, and disposes of his wife. This weight of detail may put off a reader who wants a quick and juicy true crime story. Ultimately the reader's attention pays off in knowledge of the time and place that gave birth to the wireless and all that followed it, as well as an understanding of the era. It's not an easy read, but definitely a worthwhile one that leaves the reader in anticipation of where Mr. Larson's next book will lead us.
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