Five Days in London

This history concentrates on 24-28 May 1940, when the British War Cabinet argued whether to fight on after the German breakthrough in France or to explore terms through Mussolini. The central figures are Winston Churchill, newly prime minister, and Lord Halifax, who favoured sounding out a settlement, with Chamberlain still in the room and the Dunkirk evacuation beginning. Lukacs uses diaries, minutes, and later testimony to reconstruct each day's meetings. The book is a close study of a political crisis, not a full life of Churchill and not a military history of the whole campaign.

Bound in olive cloth, cover printed in black with a picture of Churchill. Flecked grey endpapers. Flecked grey slipcase.