Faster: How a Jewish Driver, an American Heiress, and a Legendary Car Beat Hitler's Best
Written by Neal Bascomb
Narrated by Edoardo Ballerini
4/5
()
About this audiobook
fearsome Silver Arrows during the golden age of auto racing.
They were the unlikeliest of heroes. René Dreyfus, a former top driver on the international race car circuit,
had been banned from the best teams—and fastest cars—by the mid-1930s because of his Jewish heritage. Charles
Weiffenbach, head of the down-on-its-luck automaker Delahaye, was desperately trying to save his company as the
world teetered at the brink. And Lucy Schell, the adventurous daughter of an American multi-millionaire, yearned to
reclaim the glory of her rally-driving days.
As Nazi Germany launched its campaign of racial terror and pushed the world toward war, these three misfits
banded together to challenge Hitler’s dominance at the apex of motorsport: the Grand Prix. Their quest for redemption
culminated in a remarkable race that is still talked about in racing circles to this day—but which, soon after it ended,
Hitler attempted to completely erase from history. Bringing to life this glamorous era and the sport that defined it,
Faster chronicles one of the most inspiring, death-defying upsets of all time: a symbolic blow against the Nazis during
history’s darkest hour.
Neal Bascomb
NEAL BASCOMB is the national award–winning and New York Times best-selling author of The Winter Fortress, Hunting Eichmann, The Perfect Mile,Higher, The Nazi Hunters, and Red Mutiny, among others. A former international journalist, he is a widely recognized speaker on the subject of war and has appeared in a number of documentaries. He lives in Philadelphia. For more information, visit http://nealbascomb.com or find him on Twitter at @nealbascomb.
More audiobooks from Neal Bascomb
The Nazi Hunters: How a Team of Spies and Survivors Captured the World's Most Notorious Nazi Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Hunting Eichmann: How a Band of Survivors and a Young Spy Agency Chased Down the World’s Most Notorious Nazi Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Escape Artists: A Band of Daredevil Pilots and the Greatest Prison Break of the Great War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sabotage: The Mission to Destroy Hitler's Atomic Bomb (Scholastic Focus) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Higher: A Historic Race to the Sky and the Making of a City Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Grand Escape Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Red Mutiny Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Race of the Century: The Battle to Break the Four-Minute Mile (Scholastic Focus) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Salt Thief: Gandhi's Heroic March to Freedom Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Faster
Related audiobooks
Blood and Smoke: A True Tale of Mystery, Mayhem, and the Birth of the Indy 500 Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Mechanic's Tale: Life in the Pit-Lanes of Formula One Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Vagabonds: The Story of Henry Ford and Thomas Edison's Ten-Year Road Trip Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5GO! The Bettenhausen Story: The Race Against A Dream Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Man in the White Suit: The Stig, Le Mans, The Fast Lane and Me Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Long Haul: A Trucker's Tales of Life on the Road Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Boy: Stirling Moss: A Life in 60 Laps Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Across America by Motor-Cycle: Remastered and Reset Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Engines of Change: A History of the American Dream in Fifteen Cars Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Build a Car: The Autobiography of the World’s Greatest Formula 1 Designer Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Land Rover: The Story of the Car that Conquered the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Trucker's Tale: Wit, Wisdom, and True Stories from 60 Years on the Road Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Once In A Great City: A Detroit Story Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Race with Love and Death: The Story of Richard Seaman Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Higher: A Historic Race to the Sky and the Making of a City Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The World's Fastest Man: The Extraordinary Life of Cyclist Major Taylor, America's First Black Sports Hero Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Rome 1960: The Olympics that Changed the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Triumph: The Untold Story of Jesse Owens and Hitler's Olympics Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Give Me Liberty: The True Story of Oswaldo Payá and his Daring Quest for a Free Cuba Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5X Troop: The Secret Jewish Commandos of World War II Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Forty Autumns: A Family's Story of Courage and Survival on Both Sides of the Berlin Wall Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Running for My Life: One Lost Boy's Journey from the Killing Fields of Sudan to the Olympic Games Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Life on the Mississippi: An Epic American Adventure Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Racing with Rich Energy: How a Rogue Sponsor Took Formula One for a Ride Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Wonder Girl: The Magnificent Sporting Life of Babe Didrikson Za Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFins: Harley Earl, the Rise of General Motors, and the Glory Days of Detroit Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Games: A Global History of the Olympics Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Flat Out Flat Broke Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Wars & Military For You
American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Book of Five Rings Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of September 11, 2001 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5On Palestine Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ghosts of Honolulu: A Japanese Spy, A Japanese American Spy Hunter, and the Untold Story of Pearl Harbor Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Templars: The History and the Myth: From Solomon's Temple to the Freemasons Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/577 Days of February: Living and Dying in Ukraine, Told by the Nation’s Own Journalists Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel: Genius, Power, and Deception on the Eve of World War I Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Korean War: A History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Nazi Conspiracy: The Secret Plot to Kill Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You're Stepping on My Cloak and Dagger Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Valiant Women: The Extraordinary American Servicewomen Who Helped Win World War II Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Four Battlegrounds: Power in the Age of Artificial Intelligence Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Invisible Generals: Rediscovering Family Legacy, and a Quest to Honor America's First Black Generals Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Diary of Anne Frank Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fat Leonard: How One Man Bribed, Bilked, and Seduced the U.S. Navy Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5When the Sea Came Alive: An Oral History of D-Day Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Killing Patton: The Strange Death of World War II's Most Audacious General Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5We Were Soldiers Once… and Young: Ia Drang – The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Shortest History of Israel and Palestine: From Zionism to Intifadas and the Struggle for Peace Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5When I Come Home Again: 'A page-turning literary gem' THE TIMES, BEST BOOKS OF 2020 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Faster
23 ratings6 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A wild ride of a story, told so deftly, with the humanity balancing potentially overwhelming technical detail. An enriching, if exhausting listen.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Simply put this is one of the best books on the early days of Grand Prix racing I’ve ever read. It provides a vivid and excellently told portrait of motor sports in the 1930s and how Grand Prix racing and record breaking were subsumed by nationalistic politics - notably the different approaches taken in France and Germany. But even if you have zero interest in motor sports I’d still recommend this as an absorbing human drama centered around the cadre of elite drivers, their relationships on-and off the track, and their insights into the risks they took.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Excellent narrative on the late 1930's Grand Prix racing scene in Europe. Mercedes and AutoUnion were government backed teams and dominated GP racing in that era just prior to WWII. Rene Dreyfus was a jewish racing car driver competing for Delahaye. A Jew racing against the two all conquering German teams sets the scene for a dramatic story. It is very interesting, very well researched and tells the tale of this extraordinary era and Bascomb does it justice.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The last fifth of this book is very good as it builds to the final race, the rest is cursory treatment of too many races and too many people. Still, not bad for understanding the racing scene in the 1920s and 30s, when racing as we know it was invented, this era was probably the pinnacle of the sport.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5History is exciting. Especially when told as well Neal Bascomb told it here. The setting is Europe in the thirties. The subtitle tells, all the complexities of life then. At least as it effects the auto racing community and, really, how it effects people in it. Racers of what ever religion, or none, and of what ever connection to racing they have. Hitler didn't care about sport only the propaganda benefits there of. It all meshes in this book. The book reads as a great novel, but tells a true story. Even without a background in racing, I think most readers would have great pleasure reading this book. Students of auto racing this book, and then keep it near to hand for reading, again and again!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I'd been aware of the story of how Rene Dreyfus grabbed a shock victory off the German racing juggernaut in 1938 at the Pau Grand Prix for awhile (I remember seeing a documentary on it (probably on the much-missed "Speed" channel)), and have done my share of reading about racing in the period in general. What the author brings to the table is the story of Lucy Schell, the woman who gave Dreyfus his chance for glory, and a fine rally racer in her own right. Apart from that Bascomb appears to have covered all his bases (including getting input from the Dreyfus family), so this turns out to be a fine introduction to the subject for the general reader.