The Guns of August

Tuchman opens with a famous scene: the funeral of King Edward VII in London in 1910, when nine kings rode together in the procession, a final display of the old European order. She then explains the long preparations for war: Germany's Schlieffen Plan to defeat France quickly by sweeping through Belgium, France's offensive Plan 17, Britain's uncertain commitment and Russia's huge but slow army. She paints sharp portraits of the generals and statesmen, including Joffre, Moltke, Sir John French and the Kaiser.

The heart of the book covers the weeks after war was declared. Belgium refuses to let German armies pass and resists at Liège, French offensives in Alsace and Lorraine collapse under heavy losses, and the Allied armies retreat toward Paris. In the east, the Russian invasion of East Prussia ends in disaster at Tannenberg. At sea, a German warship's escape to Constantinople has unexpected consequences. Tuchman ends just as the Battle of the Marne halts the German advance, the moment when the war of movement gives way to years of trench warfare. Her style is lively, witty and full of telling detail.

Dense but compelling, a modern classic. About 608 pages in the Ballantine paperback, with maps.