"Larson, one of today's pre-eminent nonfiction storytellers, trawls a variety of archives to explore the historically momentous months between Abraham Lincoln's election and the Battle of Fort Sumter."
--The New York Times "Perhaps no other historian has ever rendered the struggle for Sumter in such authoritative detail as Larson does here. . . . Few historians, too, have done a better job of untangling the web of intrigues and counter-intrigues that helped provoke the eventual attack and surrender."
--The Washington Post "A feast of historical insight and narrative verve . . . Larson's great gift is his uncanny ability to spin a chronological story whose ending we already know--secession, rebellion, victory, emancipation and assassination--yet keep the narrative as crisp and suspenseful as an Anthony Horowitz suspense novel. . . . This is Erik Larson at his best, enlivening even a thrice-told tale into an irresistible thriller."
--The Wall Street Journal "The immediacy of the story in
The Demon of Unrest--as well as on-the-ground reports from inside South Carolina's Fort Sumter, an early Union bulwark--lend the book vigor."
--Minneapolis Star Tribune "[Larson] brings a welcome novelist's sensibility to his writing. He has an eye for telling details, quick and potent character descriptions and a relentless narrative momentum."
--The Atlanta Journal-Constitution "A thoughtful account that also offers a sobering reminder of how humans often don't see a catastrophe coming until it's too late."
--The Independent "So many volumes have been written about the origins of the American Civil War that one might heave a sigh at the thought of yet another, but Larson has found a genuinely original way of telling the story--and storytelling, on the basis of serious research, is what he does well."
--The Telegraph "Engagingly written and fraught with tension . . .
The Demon of Unrest will add to Larson's luster as one of the great historical-nonfiction writers of our time. . . . [A] literary masterwork."
--National Review "Erik Larson's latest book brings new life to an old war.
The Demon of Unrest, [his] vivid depiction of the lead-up to the Civil War, is a masterclass in reportage and storytelling."
--Garden and Gun
"An all-too-prescient tale of tension and tragedy, clashing egos, miscommunication, power, and betrayal."
--People "Even diehard Civil War aficionados will learn from [
The Demon of Unrest]. . . . A riveting reexamination of a nation in tumult.
"--Los Angeles Times "Twisty and cinematic . . . A mesmerizing and disconcerting look at an era when consensus dissolved into deadly polarization."
--Publishers Weekly (starred review)
