This book looks to be the most challenging and the most rewarding one on my list so far.  It’s well written, and reminds me of a good Robert K. Massie history .  And it’s not just the big volume about physics I feared it might be.  I don’t expect this will appeal to a huge number of people, but for anyone out there who might be considering…….here’s a review from Publishers Weekly:

“Rhodes describes the theoretical origins of the bomb, the lab experiments, the building of the prototype, the test at Alamagordo, the training of the B-29 crews assigned to deliver the first two combat bombs and the missions themselves. There’s much more. Rhodes, gifted with sharp psychological insight and a novelist’s ability to convey character, reveals the personalities and emotional dynamics among Niels Bohr, Leo Szilard, Enrico Fermi, Edward Teller, Ernest Lawrence, Robert Oppenheimer, General Leslie Groves, Colonel Paul Tibbets etc….”

And if anybody is interested, perhaps we can set up a schedule, read it together and then do an on-line chat using the notes here.