The Second World War — Antony Beevor

Beevor's single-volume history of the Second World War covers all theatres — European, African, Pacific — with the same archival depth that distinguished his earlier battle studies. The book is exceptional on the Eastern Front, where Beevor's access to Soviet archives has allowed him to correct decades of Western misrepresentation of the war's scale and savagery. At over eight hundred pages, it is the most thorough single-volume account currently available — one that takes seriously both the military and the political, and does not flinch from the human cost of either.

'An astonishing achievement. Beevor has produced the essential one-volume history of the most destructive conflict in human history.' — Andrew Roberts. 'Magisterial in scope, humane in spirit.' — Sunday Times