In the 1930s, the airship was viewed as the future of transatlantic travel and a brave new era of global connectedness. Germany’s safe, fast and efficient airships brought it back into the international fold after its humiliation in World War I. But on May 6, 1937, the Hindenburg airship caught fire in the sky over New Jersey in a blaze that shocked the world and presaged another era of senseless violence.

In Shadow Before the Flame, acclaimed historian Catherine Grace Katz uncovers fresh research that unveils the Hindenburg disaster at a pivotal moment in time, coming as it does at the crossroads of the rising tension between fascist Germany and the United States. Katz traces the experiences of a captivating cast of characters: an heiress, a world-renowned acrobat, a German Jew working to save his family from the clutches of Nazism, a young cabin boy on his first voyage with the crew. Meanwhile, on the ground were two intrepid journalists whose reporting on the Hindenburg would invent breaking news as we now know it.

In a gripping, ticking-clock narrative, Shadow Before the Flame is a story that begins with the promise of a future made bright by technological innovation and ends with caskets draped in swastikas in New York City.