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[Sigaba]

Peter Fritzsche, Life and Death in the Third Reich (ISBN-13 9780674034655).

A work of cultural, political, and social history that also incorporates a subtle understanding of military history.

Not for nothing does Geoff Eley praise this book even though Fritzsche seeks to refute his work. Source is here.

With remarkable vision and poise, Fritzsche guides us through the interior of the Third Reich's racial imaginary to explore the terrible effectiveness of the efforts required of Germans in thinking themselves into the morally coercive world of the Volksgemeinschaft. Commanding the vast literatures on Nazism with enviable facility, he seamlessly combines major themes with a keen eye for the telling detail. This is one of the most illuminating reflections on the popular history of the Third Reich in many years.

At times, Fritzsche's prose is so vibrant that you may hear the plaintive cries echoing from freight cars as their occupants hurl towards the oblivion that awaits. Only one other book--Alistair Horne's The Price of Glory: Verdun 1916--has had me seeing the dead standing at the foot of my bed.