The Hitler Years: Holocaust 1933-1945 describes in detail the development of early persecution formulated by Adolf Hitler from as far back as the early 1920s, placing in context what was to come once the Nazi Party gained power in 1933; the Nuremberg Laws to constrain the German-Jewish population. It covers the country’s slow slide into a pre-war policy of intimidation that would culminate in the murderous attacks on ‘Kristallnacht’ (the ‘Night of Broken Glass’). As Europe marched into another global conflict in 1939, tens of thousands of German Jews had fled the country only to be swept up as Hitler’s armies conquered all Western Europe. With the invasion of the Soviet Union, the secret meeting in early 1942 (the Wannsee Conference) would utilise the war in the east to plan in intricate detail the annihilation of the Jewish population on the continent – known to all now as the ‘Final Solution’.

The fully illustrated book draws together and engages with the latest scholarly research, makes extensive use of primary research, presenting a vivid and shocking narrative. A tragic and deadly period in German and European history is brought to life by one of the country’s premier scholars.

The prequel to Frank McDonough’s bestselling Hitler Years series, covering the dramatic era of German history that culminated in the rise to power of Adolf Hitler in 1933.

Established in the wake of German defeat in the First World War, the Weimar Republic held out the hope that democracy, stability and prosperity would take root in Germany. From the start, however, it was beset by political and economic upheaval and spasms of violence between left and right. Year by year, from 1918 to 1933, Frank McDonough describes the major events in both domestic and foreign policy and the personalities who shaped them, together with developments in Weimar’s flourishing cultural sphere. McDonough places particular focus on the parliamentary history of Weimar, arguing that it was the failure of parliamentary democracy to bring stability that allowed the power of the elected Reichstag to diminish, leading to Hitler’s accession to power.

The Weimar Years is the tragic story of a rise and fall, as well as a warning of how, under poor leadership, economic pressure and unrelenting political instability, a democracy can drift towards a form of authoritarian rule that eventually destroys it.

At the beginning of 1940 Germany was at the pinnacle of its power. By May 1945 Hitler was dead and Germany had suffered a disastrous defeat.

Hitler had failed to achieve his aim of making Germany a super power and had left her people to cope with the endless shame of the Holocaust.

In The Hitler Years ~ Disaster 1940-1945, Professor Frank McDonough charts the dramatic change of fortune for the Third Reich, and challenges long-held accounts of the Holocaust and Germany’s ultimate defeat.

Despite Hitler’s grand ambitions and the successful early stages of the Third Reich’s advances into Europe, Frank McDonough argues that Germany was only ever a middle-ranking power and never truly stood a chance against the combined forces of the Allies.

Praise for Frank McDonough:

‘Superbly scholarly and just as readable’ Dan Snow

‘The Hitler Years ~ Disaster and its companion volume, The Hitler Years ~ Triumph, are not just informative on a nearly encyclopaedic level, they are well-researched, well-structured, and well-written. What’s more, they are relevant and challenging. Through questioning the myths that still exist, they encourage the reader to think in a new way, not just about the past, but about the present and the future’ Get History

‘McDonough has provided fascinating insights into the experiences of Germans in a fickle and frightening world’ The Times, on The Gestapo