A vibrant leviathan that sailed the world's oceans in the name of the United States, she was already twenty-seven years old on December 7, 1941. But she was still the pride of the Navy and favorite of President Franklin D. Roosevelt who witnessed her keel laying in the Brooklyn Navy Yard in 1914. Like an ageless siren, the USS ARIZONA could still draw a smile, even from those newfangled aircraft carriers whose airplanes buzzed her like angry bees during war games. Had the awful events of that fateful Sunday morning not occurred at Pearl Harbor, the ARIZONA probably would have passed the rest of her life peacefully and been scrapped sooner than later. However, her fate would be to serve as a focal point of hate and vengeance when she and most of her crew were incinerated. But...was it a bomb that destroyed her, or was ARIZONA the first casualty of longstanding international gamesmanship that led to war for the United States? A STRING OF PEARLS engages the reader in a series of "what-ifs." Get to know ARIZONA's men. Listen in on conversations between Churchill and Roosevelt and Russian diplomats. Fly in a Spitfire during the Battle of Britain. Visit with ordinary military men who would be asked to perform extraordinary feats. Get to know the women who loved and sacrificed for them. Fly in the Japanese formations as they rehearse for and attack Pearl Harbor. And settle back to listen to Glenn Miller's orchestra play "A String of Pearls."