Following the First World War three of the largest European Empires collapsed, with the German Empire being the last, after the November revolution broke out in several harbours and cities, and spread ...

Let me say that if all military histories were as thrilling and well-written as Robert Gaudi’s “African Kaiser” (Caliber, $29, 436 pages), I might give up reading fiction and literary biography.

This week marks the centennial of U.S. entry into World War I, a conflict that shattered empires and cost millions of lives. On the American home front, it made this country less culturally German.