Former Instructor Erik Larson's New Nonfiction Maritime Thriller, 'Dead Wake'

SAVANNAH MORNING NEWS -- Erik Larson makes the past come to life, writing books about history that read like fiction. With best-sellers that include “The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic and Madness at the Fair That Changed America,” “Thunderstruck” and “In The Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin,” he has thrilled readers around the globe. His latest book is “Dead Wake: The Last Voyage of the Lusitania,” which Larson is bringing to the Savannah Book Festival. The fastest ship of its day, the Lusitania was steaming from New York to Liverpool when on May 7, 1915, it was torpedoed by a German submarine off the coast of southern Ireland, resulting in a loss of 1,198 passengers and crew and just 764 survivors. Larson has taught nonfiction writing at San Francisco State University, the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars and University of Oregon.