1918 YEAR OF VICTORY is an original and very readable account of one of the most significant and often misunderstood events of the last century. With an historian’s eye for clear headed analysis combined with incredible attention to detail and narrative, the Australian War Memorial’s Ashley Ekins presents a compelling account of the world’s first ‘great war’ and its legacy.The Great War of 1914–1918 casts a long shadow. It is over 90 years since the last shots were fired, ending a global conflict that consumed the lives and hopes of so many of its generation. The catastrophic scale of the war and its immense human cost haunted the survivors and in just over a decade, the victory of 1918 was eroded by the apparent failure of the Versailles peace settlement, the rise of Nazism and the approach of the Second World War. Many believe the Great War set the pattern for the large-scale violence, devastation and genocide witnessed throughout the wars of the 20th century.