Now in paperback, this is a magisterial chronicle of the calamity that crippled Europe in 1914, the beginning of WWI. Hastings explains how and why this war, which shattered and changed the West forever, was fought. From the author of }All Hell Let Loose{, which sold 260,000 copies. 'One could scarcely ask for a better guide to these horrors than Max Hastings... he is a superb writer with a rare gift for evoking the rhythm, mood and raw physical terror of battle.' }Mail On Sunday{. Not final jacket image.