After watching the horrifying HBO mini-series, Chernobyl, and listening to the companion podcast, I wanted to go back to the beginning of nuclear power and hear the story from one of the key players. I'd started this book a couple of times over the years but never got past the introduction. This time, I got into it and couldn't put it down.... It's an astounding account of project management and leadership, and all the people (and companies) that stepped up to help make this extraordinary achievement happen. Groves was the just-promoted Army General who ran the Manhattan Project. The scope of his responsibilities was astounding - including engineering, construction and operation of the plants to make the bomb materials, R&D (he hired Oppenheimer to manage the science), security and counter-intelligence as well as global intelligence related to atomic activities, selecting the target cities and managing the execution of the actual delivery of the bombs. Ironically, whe...