The World That Never Was

The World That Never Was

A True Story of Dreamers, Schemers, Anarchists and Secret Agents

Summary

The last years of the nineteenth century saw the birth of a new phenomenon: international terrorism. Bombings and assassinations shook the great cities of Europe and America, threatening social order. Fiendish networks of anarchist conspiritors were blamed and the public whipped into a frenzy of anxiety.

The reality was rather different. These dramatic events were only the most visible part of a longer, clandestine struggle waged between the forces of revolution and reaction, in which little was as it seemed. Alex Butterworth interweaves group biography, cultural history and meticulous detective work to create a revelatory account of the age. Both intimate and panoramic, it is a story with uncanny resonances for today.

Reviews

  • Exhilarating...almost any paragraph packs more action than an entire Dan Brown novel
    Financial Times

About the author

Alex Butterworth

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