A modern master of the historical novel, Jeff Shaara has
painted brilliant depictions of the Civil War, the
Revolutionary War, and World War I. Now he embarks upon
his most ambitious epic, a trilogy about the military
conflict that defined the twentieth century. The Rising
Tide begins a staggering work of fiction bound to be a new
generation’s most poignant chronicle of World War II. With
you-are-there immediacy, painstaking historical detail,
and all-inclusive points of view, Shaara portrays the
momentous and increasingly dramatic events that pulled
America into the vortex of this monumental conflict.
As Hitler conquers Poland, Norway, France, and most of
Western Europe, England struggles to hold the line. When
Germany’s ally Japan launches a stunning attack on Pearl
Harbor, America is drawn into the war, fighting to hold
back the Japanese conquest of the Pacific, while standing
side-by-side with their British ally, the last hope for
turning the tide of the war.
Through unforgettable battle scenes in the unforgiving
deserts of North Africa and the rugged countryside of
Sicily, Shaara tells this story through the voices of this
conflict’s most heroic figures, some familiar, some
unknown. As British and American forces strike into
the “soft underbelly” of Hitler’s Fortress Europa, the new
weapons of war come clearly into focus. In North Africa,
tank battles unfold in a tapestry of dust and fire unlike
any the world has ever seen. In Sicily, the Allies attack
their enemy with a barely tested weapon: the paratrooper.
As battles rage along the coasts of the Mediterranean, the
momentum of the war begins to shift, setting the stage for
the massiveinvasion of France, at a seaside resort called
Normandy.
More than an unprecedented and intimate portrait of those
who waged this astonishing global war, The Rising Tide is
a vivid gallery of characters both immortal and unknown:
the as-yet obscure administrator Dwight D. Eisenhower,
whose tireless efficiency helped win the war; his
subordinates, clashing in both style and personality, from
George Patton and Mark Clark to Omar Bradley and Bernard
Montgomery. In the desolate hills and deserts, the Allies
confront Erwin Rommel, the battlefield genius known
as “the Desert Fox,” a wounded beast who hands the
Americans their first humiliating defeat in the European
theater of the war. From tank driver to paratrooper to the
men who gave the commands, Shaara’s stirring portrayals
bring the heroic and the tragic to life in brilliant
detail.
A new level of accomplishment from this already acclaimed
author, The Rising Tide will leave readers eager for the
next volume of this superb saga of the war that saved and
changed the world.