The fast-paced and gripping true account of the extraordinary construction and spectacular demise of the main element West Railroad-one of the best engineering feats ever undertaken, destroyed in one fell swoop from the strongest storm ever going to U.S. shores.

In 1904, the brilliant and driven business owner Henry Flagler, partner to John D. Rockefeller, imagined a railway hooking up the island of Key Western to the Florida mainland, crossing a staggering 153 miles of open ocean-an engineering challenge beyond actually that of the Panama Canal. Many considered the project difficult, but build it they do. The railroad stood as an impressive achievement for more than twenty-two years, heralded as “the Eighth Wonder of the Globe,” until its total damage in 1935’s lethal storm from the century.

In Last Train to Paradise, Standiford celebrates this crowning achievement of Gilded Age group ambition, bringing to life a sweeping story of the effective forces of human being ingenuity colliding using the even greater forces of nature’s wrath.