“Lusitania” by Greg King and Penny Wilson – A Ship of Dreams

Though the First World War is being pushed back further and further into our history books as the years go by, there is no doubt that it was a rather important event in mankind's history, at least speaking in more recent terms.

 There are many individual stories, bits and pieces of information to explore (as is the case with any war, I would imagine), and perhaps one of the more overlooked ones is that of the Lusitania, the ship whose sinking led the United States to actively enter the conflict.

In Lusitania, Greg King and Penny Wilson review the ship's history, the people it carried on its final voyage, and all the theories that have been conjured up around the event. In other words, we are treated to plenty of details on where the ship itself came from, about the countless millionaires, writers, politicians, actors, actresses and aristocrats it carried.

We are told in detail about that faithless encounter with a primitive German U-boat, pitting modern technology against that of the world, about its tragic sinking and all the consequences that came with it.

After exploring the factual and well-known side of the equation, King and Wilson delve deeper beneath the surface, looking at what the aftermath had brought: an innumerable amount of questions.

Amongst the various theories explored we find one where the ship was secretly used to transport munitions and another one where Churchill was in fact the mastermind behind its doom.

Add to that the colorful mix of important characters that you could find on the ship during its final voyage, and you've got a ripe, golden conspiracy jackpot to sift through.

As far as actually teaching the reader about the historical events that took place, Lusitania is actually a book I can safely recommend to anyone. The facts aren't changed for entertainment's sake, and they always remain accurate, being obtained from official and verified sources.

Now, as you can guess, that doesn't mean the prose is dry and boring. On the contrary, the fate bestowed upon this ship from its creation to its downfall is recounted like an actual tale, one whose conclusion isn't foreknown to us. \

In other words, if the Lusitania and America's entrance into the First World War are topics of curiosity for you, then you'd do well to have a look at this work of literature simply for how well it combines entertainment with delivering all the pertinent information we could ask for.

Now, on the other hand, when it comes to exploring the various theories and whatnot that revolve around the ship's sinking, I believe that even those of us who want to believe in conspiracy theories will be disappointed.

In many cases they present pure speculation and jump to conclusions, and yes I am aware that this is about as much information as we'll have on the topic at this point... but nevertheless, it does take you out of the book when ridiculousness slaps you in the face.

At the same time I have to admit that some of them were actually quite fun to read, and a few even had some more or less legitimate support to them, so it's far from being all bad.

In any case, the Lusitania is a piece of history that deserves to be explored and remembered throughout the ages, and this book does a great job at making that point.

Accurate, educational and entertaining, it is most certainly something I'd recommend to those seeking to learn of the ship's fate, and everything surrounding that.

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	Greg King Greg King is an American author who has specialized most of his career around the biographies of important historical figures, having become entranced with the subject after watching two movies about Imperial Russia's last royal family. Some of his better-known published works include The Mad King, The Fate of the Romanovs and The Assassination of the Archduke.
	Penny Wilson Penny Wilson is an American author who has focused most of her work around history, co-writing a number of novels with Greg King, including Lusitania and The Fate of the Romanovs.