NYT Bestselling Author Rick Atkinson Discusses "The Fate of the Day"

“The nation’s finest military historian, living or dead.” —GEORGE WILL, The Washington Post

“To say that Atkinson can tell a story is like saying Sinatra can sing.” —JOSEPH J. ELLIS, The New York Times Book Review

It requires exceptional skill to bring new depth and breadth of knowledge to well-studied history—let alone to do so in a vivid, sweeping narrative that captivates readers. Pulitzer Prize–winning historian and #1 New York Times bestselling author Rick Atkinson is among a select few who can claim such abilities, earning him the distinction of being one of our modern era’s preeminent historians.

Now, coinciding with the 250th anniversary of the beginning of America’s war for independence, Crown Publishing will release THE FATE OF THE DAY: The War for America, Fort Ticonderoga to Charleston, 1777-1780 (on sale April 29, 2025), the second volume of the landmark Revolution Trilogy by the bestselling author of The British Are Coming.

The first twenty-one months of the American Revolution—which began at Lexington and ended at Princeton—was the story of a ragged group of militiamen and soldiers fighting to forge a new nation. By the winter of 1777, the exhausted Continental Army could claim only that it had barely escaped annihilation by the world’s most formidable fighting force. Two years into the war, King George III is as determined as ever to bring his rebellious colonies to heel. But the king’s task is now exponentially more complicated: fighting a determined enemy on the other side of the Atlantic has become ruinously expensive, and spies tell him that the French and Spanish are threatening to join forces with the Americans.

Here, Atkinson provides a riveting narrative covering the middle years of the Revolution. Stationed in Paris, Benjamin Franklin woos the French; in Pennsylvania, George Washington pleads with Congress to deliver the money, men, and materiel he needs to continue the fight. In New York, General William Howe, the commander of the greatest army the British have ever sent overseas, plans a new campaign against the Americans—even as he is no longer certain that he can win this searing, bloody war. The months and years that follow bring epic battles at Brandywine, Saratoga, Monmouth, and Charleston, an infamous winter of misery in Valley Forge, and yet more appeals for sacrifice by every American committed to the struggle for freedom.

A winner of Pulitzer Prizes for history and journalism, Rick Atkinson has produced a remarkable oeuvre of bestselling history that includes the Liberation Trilogy (the first volume, An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa, 1942–1943, received the Pulitzer in History), The Long Gray Line, Crusade, In the Company of Soldiers, and, most recently, The British Are Coming, the critically acclaimed first volume of his eagerly anticipated Revolution Trilogy. A multi-week New York Times bestseller, The British Are Coming won the George Washington Prize (awarded by Mount Vernon and its partners), the New-York Historical Society’s Barbara and David Zalaznick Book Prize, the Daughters of the American Revolution Excellence in American History Book Award, and the Fraunces Tavern Museum Book Award.

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