Advance Britannia - by Alan Allport (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

The author of Britain at Bay--which The Wall Street Journal said may be "the single best examination of British politics, society, and strategy [from 1938 to 1941] that has ever been written"--picks up his sweeping social history in 1942, when what was once a regional war has become an intricate, globe-spanning conflict, with profound consequences for the British Empire and for a British people already exhausted after more than two years of fighting.

"The Japanese, gone berserk, have struck in the Pacific, joined up with the Axis, declared war on us," one British soldier wrote in his diary. "So the Yanks are now our comrades in arms, and the whole world's ablaze."

By 1942, Churchill found himself facing a vastly different war than the one he'd inherited from Neville Chamberlain back in 1940. In the East, the Soviets were now a co-belligerent (if not exactly a firm ally). And the aid he'd so longed for from across the Atlantic had finally arrived, when Pearl Harbor pushed America to end its "dithering and buggering about." But with Parliament and the public losing faith in him, Churchill had to manage a war that now stretched into the Pacific and Indian Oceans, threatening Britain's colonies, all the while negotiating a new relationship with Roosevelt and Stalin--two jostling, unpredictable comrades-in-arms fully prepared to carve up the world to their own satisfaction.

In this sequel to his prizewinning Britain at Bay, Alan Allport completes his superlative history of Britain's role in World War II, once again weaving together the political, military, social, and cultural to tell a multifaceted story of a country forced to endure the profound stresses of total war. Now, Britain is no longer at bay. But any victory remains far off, and its costs will be great. Can the British win the war without sacrificing so much along the way that they then lose the peace?

Review Quotes

"The build-up to the English Civil War is a political thriller like no other. Moving from field to street and alehouse to Parliament, Jonathan Healey captures all the tension and excitement of those critical few months when the country teetered on the brink. He shows clearly, immersively and with a tempo that matches the moment just how quickly a constitution can unravel and violence prevail." --Jessie Childs, author of Siege of Loyalty House

"A gripping and elegantly crafted story. Jonathan Healey writes with clarity, compassion, and a keen eye for human truth. A truly affecting read." --Rob Rinder, author of The Trial

"Bristling with energy, packed with humour and humanity, The Blood in Winter unfolds like a thriller to tell the dramatic story of how England collapsed into civil war in 1642. In his trademark clear and compelling style, Healey mines rich research for vivid treasures to give us narrative history at its finest: quite simply superb." --Miranda Malins, author of The Rebel Daughter

"A superb history. Healey has the rare ability to make the 17th century accessible without being patronising, and to cover big and important themes while keeping the reader royally entertained." --Sam Freedman, author of Into the Bright Sunshine

"Healey has done it again. The Blood in Winter is history as it should be told, where new light is cast upon one of the most dramatic years in British history. Shaped by meticulous research and a narrative worthy of any political thriller, the result is masterful." --Alice Loxton, author of Eighteen

"This is everything a history book should be. Healey fills his narrative with portraits of extraordinary characters, which combine to make his account of Britain's descent into Civil War a truly human one. Nothing could be more relevant to us now, in this political moment, than a history like The Blood in Winter that gives an example of how fast and almost accidentally nations can fall apart, and the individual decisions of conscience that must be made along the way." --Ophelia Field, author of The Favourite

About the Author

ALAN ALLPORT, a British-born historian, is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society who specializes in the British role in World War II. He received a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and is currently the Dr. Walter Montgomery and Marian Gruber Professor of History in the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. He is the author of Britain at Bay: The Epic Story of the Second World War, 1938-1941, which won the Historical Writers' Association Non-Fiction Crown Award; Demobbed: Coming Home After the Second World War (2010), winner of the Longman-History Today Book Prize; and Browned Off and Bloody-Minded: The British Soldier Goes to War 1939-1945 (2015). He lives in Syracuse, New York.