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    The Glorious Cause: A Novel of the American Revolution
    Unavailable
    The Glorious Cause: A Novel of the American Revolution
    Unavailable
    The Glorious Cause: A Novel of the American Revolution
    Audiobook (abridged)6 hours

    The Glorious Cause: A Novel of the American Revolution

    Written by Jeff Shaara

    Narrated by Barry Bostwick

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    In Rise to Rebellion, bestselling author Jeff Shaara captured the origins of the American Revolution as brilliantly as he depicted the Civil War in Gods and Generals and The Last Full Measure. Now he continues the amazing saga of how thirteen colonies became a nation, taking the conflict from kingdom and courtroom to the bold and bloody battlefields of war.

    It was never a war in which the outcome was obvious. Despite their spirit and stamina, the colonists were outmanned and outfought by the brazen British army. General George Washington found his troops trounced in the battles of Brooklyn and Manhattan and retreated toward Pennsylvania. With the future of the colonies at its lowest ebb, Washington made his most fateful decision: to cross the Delaware River and attack the enemy. The stunning victory at Trenton began a saga of victory and defeat that concluded with the British surrender at Yorktown, a moment that changed the history of the world.

    The despair and triumph of America's first great army is conveyed in scenes as powerful as any Shaara has written, a story told from the points of view of some of the most memorable characters in American history. There is George Washington, the charismatic leader who held his army together to achieve an unlikely victory; Charles Cornwallis, the no-nonsense British general, more than a match for his colonial counterpart; Nathaniel Greene, who rose from obscurity to become the finest battlefield commander in Washington's army; The Marquis de Lafayette, the young Frenchman who brought a soldier's passion to America; and Benjamin Franklin, a brilliant man of science and philosophy who became the finest statesman of his day.

    From Nathan Hale to Benedict Arnold, William Howe to "Light Horse" Harry Lee, from Trenton and Valley Forge, Brandywine and Yorktown, the American Revolution's most immortal characters and poignant moments are brought to life in remarkable Shaara style. Yet, The Glorious Cause is more than just a story of the legendary six-year struggle. It is a tribute to an amazing people who turned ideas into action and fought to declare themselves free. Above all, it is a riveting novel that both expands and surpasses its beloved author's best work.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateOct 29, 2002
    ISBN9780739301098
    Unavailable
    The Glorious Cause: A Novel of the American Revolution
    Author

    Jeff Shaara

    JEFF SHAARA is the award-winning, New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and Publishers Weekly bestselling author of seventeen novels, including Rise to Rebellion and The Rising Tide, as well as Gods and Generals and The Last Full Measure - two novels that complete his father's Pulitzer Prize-winning classic, The Killer Angels. Shaara was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, grew up in Tallahassee, Florida, and lives in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

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    Reviews for The Glorious Cause

    4/5

    208 ratings12 reviews

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    • 4/5
      This was a very long listen...approximately 24 hours. It's a look at detailed events leading up to the American Revolution. The characters all have dialogue, which makes it a novel; they are many and familiar. The four point-of-view characters in this book are George Washington, Nathaniel Green, Lord Cornwallis, and Benjamin Franklin. Despite my efforts to put it down at various points during the read, i always came back. I learned something more each time.
    • 5/5
      This was my purse book which is why it took so long to read it. I totally enjoyed it! I wish it had covered Charles Lee's court-martial, especially with all that Washington had to go through with his insubordination and disrespect. Instead, Lee's arrogant self and his hounds disappear from the book which worked for me. Arthur Lee wasn't a likable person either successfully undercutting Silas Deane and attempting to sabotage Benjamin Franklin's mission to France. A very interesting detailed book.
    • 4/5
      The best American historical fiction writer around today.
    • 5/5
      Think you know the Revolutionary War? So did I, but I find the more I read, the more I didn't know. This book picks up with Brooklyn and goes through to the final siege of Yorktown. Nobody writes war stories like Shaara. He does such a great job of describing the key figures, of telling the story behind the conflict, and of explaining where things are happening. I have a hard time picturing things out without a map. I'm not really a visual reader. So if a writer gets to specific about where things are going on, I can't piece it together unless there's a map. But for me, the people were really what made the story come alive. I loved reading about them. Ben Franklin, General Cornwallis, Lafayette, Washington - all of them were there, including my cousin, Nathanael Greene. (Yeah, it's distant, but still, he's my cuz!) He even takes the time to tell one scene from the perspective of a captive on the prison ships held in New York, as Cornwallis sails back to England. Absolutely 5 stars.
    • 4/5
      If you like Shaara you'll like this. No surprises here at all.
    • 4/5
      This is one historical novel that's as much history as it is novel. It reads very much like some popular histories I've read, with the only significant difference being the absence of footnotes/endnotes. Although the novel is long (nearly 700 pages in the mass market paperback edition), it necessarily hits only the highlights of the Revolutionary War, with some conflicts such as the Battle of Saratoga receiving only a brief mention. Shaara's selection of the skirmishes and major battles for his tale serves to reveal the strengths and weaknesses of the officers on each side of the conflict, the opportunities that were either taken advantage of or wasted, and the fragility of the American cause on many occcasions.I was probably in high school the last time I read a general overview of the Revolutionary War. Most of the reading I've done since then has focused on specific battles, geographic regions, or individual participants. The book provided me with a useful overview of the war as well as an entertaining read.Shaara's novel allows the reader to experience the war from the perspective of several key figures, providing insight into what they might have thought and felt about the war. It will not substitute for any of the standard histories of the American Revolution, but I highly recommend it as supplmenetary reading.
    • 3/5
      None of these are as good as "The Killer Angels", but Jeff Shaara keepts trying. Not bad, just not great.
    • 1/5
      The war ended before Yorktown so how did this battle change anything , American wished for history...
    • 5/5
      The breadth of Shaara's knowledge and ability to breathe make people and events come to life is awesome.
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed The Glorious Cause almost as much as Rise to Rebellion. Both bring the "characters" to life much better than your standard biography. And don't let the "novel" part of this deter you—it is very well researched and aligns as well with other nonfiction books on the subject I've read. Excellent!
    • 3/5

       This was a thoroughly researched novel of the American Revolution.  This volume focused on the battles of the American Revolution.  There was a lot of historical detail added to the story and I found the plotlines dragged at times.  The best parts of the story revolved around George Washington trying to get money and supplies for his troops.  The battles" back and forth with the Continental Congress were intriguing and I learned a lot about his struggles behind the scenes.  I also liked the Afterword where Shaara told the after story of all the major players in the Revolution on both sides of the war.

      "
    • 4/5
      The Glorious Cause is a very well written and often times epic in scope novel about the Revolutionary War. It mostly uses the point of view of the major people involved in the war, primarily through the eyes of George Washington, who is more or less the central character of the novel. Shaara really goes through great pains to show the struggles that the Colonialists had to go through before things finally turned around. They had to show amazing resiliency overcoming horrible situations. It’s one thing to know the history of what happened from a class or a textbook, but this novel makes it come alive. Of all the characters in the novel, George Washington is the one that really stands out with his inner strength and refusal to fail. The prose is strong and the voice that the author uses fits the narrative and the times. Although a bit long-winded this is a strong novel that I would recommend.Carl Alves – author of Blood Street