"[A] devastating new history of the infamous death factory.... Rees's research is impeccable and intrepid" -The Washington Post

In Auschwitz, Laurence Rees provides a shocking portrait of the world's most infamous death camp. Informed by more than 100 original interviews with survivors and Nazi perpetrators who speak on the record for the first time, Rees' narrative exposes the inner workings of the camp in unprecedented detail-from the techniques of mass murder to the bizarre microcosms that emerged within the camp, such as the brothel and the dining hall, where the line between guard and prisoner became surprisingly blurred.

Ultimately, raves the Washington Post, Auschwitz achieves "at the gut level what Hannah Arendt achieved some forty years ago at the level of philosophy...[it] forces the reader to shift the Holocaust out of the realm of nightmare or Gothic horror and acknowledge it as something all too human." A major bestseller in Great Britain, this critically acclaimed volume is a vital addition to our understanding of the Second World War, the Holocaust, and the human potential for committing unthinkable evil....

In this revelatory chronicle of World War II, Laurence Rees, winner of the 2006 British Book Award for History, documents the dramatic and secret deals that helped make the war possible and prompted some of the most crucial decisions made during the conflict.

Drawing on material available only since opening of archives in Eastern Europe and Russia, Rees reexamines the key choices made by Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt during the war. And as the truth about Stalin’s earlier friendly relationship with the Nazis is laid bare, a devastating and surprising picture of the Soviet leader emerges.

The emotional core of the book is the amazing new testimony obtained from nearly a hundred separate witnesses from the period—former Soviet secret policemen, Allied seamen who braved Arctic convoys and Red Army veterans who engaged Germans in hand-to-hand fighting on the Eastern Front. Their dramatic personal experiences make clear in a compelling and fresh way the reasons why the people of Poland, the Baltic states and other European countries simply swapped the rule of one tyrant for another.

Rees’ ability to weave high politics—the meeting of the Allied leaders at Tehran, Yalta and Potsdam—with the dramatic personal experiences of those on the ground who bore the consequences of their decisions is eye opening. World War II Behind Closed Doors will change the way we think about the Second World War....