Burning the Reichstag: an investigation into the Third Reich's enduring mystery

In February 1933, Adolf Hitler had only a tenuous grasp on power.

Chancellor of Germany for merely four weeks, he led a fragile coalition government.

The Nazis had lost seats in the Reichstag in the recent election, and claimed only three of thirteen cabinet posts.

Then on February 27th, arson sent the Reichstag, the home and symbol of German democracy, up in flames.

Immediately blaming the Communists, Hitler's new government approved a decree that tore the heart out of the democratic constitution of the Weimar Republic and cancelled the rule of law.

Hett offers a gripping account of Hitler's rise to dictatorship - one that challenges orthodoxy and recovers the true significance of the part the fire played.