When Hitler Took Cocaine and Lenin Lost His Brain: By Giles Milton.
Do you like trivia and strange stories from history? If you do, and you’re looking for a great read, then I highly recommend what Mr Milton has created here. It’s perfect for dipping into as each true story is a short one and you’ll learn such a lot about the weird and the wonderful.
One or two of these tales from history might be familiar to you (and see the links below to some of my own favourites) but you’ll find a some fascinating stories about, for example:
- The last Chinese eunuch
- The Navajo language and its use in WW2
- What happened to the last dodos
- The British attempt at building an ‘Eiffel Tower’
- The pygmy at the Bronx Zoo
- The escape from Alcatraz
- The female Robinson Crusoe
And plenty more – there are twenty five true life stories in this book that will be sure to keep you entertained.
The author explains that he spends a great deal of time searching through historical archives and that this is where he has discovered most of these stories – many completely unknown – and as he says in the preface, we learn something about ourselves as well.
This is because, he writes, that he asks himself what he would do if he found himself in some of the situations described in his book. As he says:
… anything can happen to anyone: who knows, you may yet get caught in an adventure that will one day be recognised as a highly prized nugget of history.
I guess that’s true. Most of the stories in this book are about ordinary people – people who have found themselves in unusual, or even bizarre, situations.
You’ll find more books by Mr Milton below. I strongly recommend the first one on the left – it had me laughing out loud!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
