The Trigger: Hunting the Assassin Who Brought the World to War

· Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Gerard Doyle
1 review
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9 hr 32 min
Unabridged
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On a summer morning in Sarajevo almost a hundred years ago, a teenager took a pistol out of his pocket and fired not just the opening rounds of the First World War but the starting gun for modern history. By killing Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Gavrilo Princip started a cycle of events that would leave 15 million dead from fighting between 1914 and 1918 and that proved fatal for empires and a way of ruling that had held for centuries.



The Trigger tells the story of a young man who changed the world forever. It focuses on the drama of the incident itself by following Princip's journey. By retracing his steps from the feudal frontier village of his birth, through the mountains of the northern Balkans to the great plain city of Belgrade, and ultimately to Sarajevo, Tim Butcher illuminates our understanding of Princip and makes discoveries about him that have eluded historians for a hundred years. Traveling through the Balkans on Princip's trail, and drawing on his own experiences there as a war reporter during the 1990s, Butcher unravels this complex part of the world and its conflicts, and shows how the events that were sparked that day in June 1914 still have influence today. Published for the centenary of the assassination, The Trigger is a rich and timely work, part travelogue, part reportage, and part history.
On a summer morning in Sarajevo almost a hundred years ago, a teenager took a pistol out of his pocket and fired not just the opening rounds of the First World War but the starting gun for modern history. By killing Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Gavrilo Princi...

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1 review
THE LORD
October 7, 2018
Double Jeopardy
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About the author

Tim Butcher is a bestselling author and explorer whose books blend history with travel. His first book, Blood River, was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize, and his second, Chasing the Devil, was longlisted for the Orwell Prize. Tim is a former foreign correspondent for the Daily Telegraph. He lives in Cape Town with his family.

Gerard Doyle records everything from adult, young adult, and children's books to literary fiction, mysteries, humor, adventure, and fantasy. He has won countless AudioFile Earphones Awards and was named a Best Voice in Young Adult Fiction in 2008.

Tim Butcher is a bestselling author and explorer whose books blend history with travel. His first book, Blood River, was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize, and his second, Chasing the Devil, was longlisted for the Orwell Prize. Tim is a former foreign correspondent for the Daily Telegraph....

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