About this product

Product Identifiers

PublisherSimon & Schuster Children's Publishing

ISBN-100689813295

ISBN-139780689813290

eBay Product ID (ePID)516193

Product Key Features

Book TitleCountdown to Independence

Number of Pages368 Pages

LanguageEnglish

Publication Year2001

TopicRoyalty, Biographical / United States, General, Historical / Europe, Historical / United States / Colonial & Revolutionary Periods

IllustratorYes

GenreJuvenile Fiction

AuthorNatalie S. Bober

FormatHardcover

Dimensions

Item Height1.1 in

Item Weight39.3 Oz

Item Length10.3 in

Item Width8.3 in

Additional Product Features

Intended AudienceYoung Adult Audience

LCCN99-027086

ReviewsJeremy BlackProfessor of History University of Exeter, EnglandAn exciting, accessible, and accurate account of the birth of America. A skillful interweaving of developments in America and Britain that makes the patriotic story relevant for modern readers. A really good read, fair to both sides., Joseph EllisFord Foundation Chair in History Mount Holyoke CollegeNatalie Bober has provided what is probably the most thorough and intellectually sophisticated narrative that any [young adult] book on the Revolution has ever attempted. Even British readers, who normally prefer to skip this awkward moment in Anglo-American relations, should feel that their side gets a fair shake. Bravo. I salute its distillation of scholarship, sense of drama, eye for character, and memorable quotations. Intellectually, you have a winner.

Dewey Edition21

Grade FromSeventh Grade

Grade ToUP

Dewey Decimal973.3/11

Table Of ContentTable of Contents Author's NoteChronologyMain Characters in the ColoniesMain Characters in EnglandIntroduction: A special kind of Englishman "George, be a King!" "brought to a collision" Salutary neglect "the privileges of Englishmen" "the approaching storm" "Liberty, Property, and no Stamps!" "We may still light candles" "a bundle of sticks" "saucy Americans" "glorious tidings" "senseless glory" "further mischiefs" A study in contrasts "Town born, turn out!" "Wilkes and Liberty!" "My honourmy country" "firmness is the characteristick of an Englishman" "a spark of patriotic fire" "They won't take the tea" "that baneful weed" "The Dye is now cast" "a blot on the page of history" spare the rod and spoil the child "a Nursery of American Statesmen" "Blows must decide" "give me liberty or give me death!" "O! What a glorious morning is this!" English power, English honor "we have taken up arms" "seduced into war" "steering opposite courses" The magic of the monarchy "an asylum for mankind" Independence! Reference NotesBibliographyPhoto CreditsIndex

SynopsisFor fifteen years between 1760 and 1775, before a drop of blood was shed at Lexington and Concord, ideas were the weapons with which Americans and Englishmen waged a revolution. Words of protest did not become deeds of resistance until both sides came to realize that only force would decide the issues that divided the empire.How did the social, political, and intellectual developments of the colonial period precipitate a shocking revolution by the American colonists against Great Britain? What was the British view of the situation in America? Who were the people involved (both Whigs and Tories) in the American colonies and in England? What were the issues that were brewing below the surface that made it possible for a ragged band of patriots to defeat the strongest army in the world? Was the ultimate separation of the American colonies from England inevitable, or could it have been avoided?Focusing on the period from the ascendance of George III to the throne of Great Britain until the approval in the Continental Congress of the Declaration of Independence, acclaimed biographer Natalie S. Bober attempts to answer these, and other questions, as she presents a bi-focal view of the events leading to the Revolutionary War -- telling the story through the eyes of the heroes and rebels involved onbothsides of the Atlantic Ocean. Recognizing that biography is the human heart of history, she has used engaging mini-biographies of the cast of British and American characters. By taking her readers into the actual scenes, both in America and England and revealing the human stories behind the historic events, and by using original sources such as letters, diaries, and speeches, she allows the characters who played a role in the unfolding drama to step off the pages of the book and become living people.As she captures the drama, the wit, the politics, and the manners of the generation that governed and lost the first British Empire, all the while doing full justice to the cause of the colonial patriots, she takes her readers on a provocative and stimulating countdown to independence.

LC Classification NumberE210.B57 2001