Seizing Destiny

Praise

“In Seizing Destiny Richard Kluger has given us a vivid narrative of just how British colonials and then citizens of a new nation swept aside everything in their path as they spread their dominion from the Atlantic to the Pacific. This is not a celebratory story, but it is brilliant history.”
--Dan Carter, author of Scottsboro

"This is history on a grand scale, the story of a colonial wilderness as it grew in size and power to be the geographic and political United States of today. Kluger has created an overarching narrative without scanting the drama of individual episodes. Seizing Destiny is not a whitewash: greed, cunning, bloodshed, and chicanery play a large part in enforcing the sometimes fatally tempting notion of manifest destiny. This is an important book and a timely one as well, especially given our present misery about where 'destiny,' guided by our national 'decider,' is taking us.” -- Justin Kaplan, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain

“Epic themes have returned in full force to the writing of American history, as is evident in this sweeping narrative of how Americans, as F. Scott Fitzgerald put it, encountered a continent commensurate to their capacity for wonder and–suppressing all doubts and reservations–made of it one nation, with oceanic territories, protectorates, and an affiliated commonwealth thrown in for good measure.” --Kevin Starr, author, California, A History

“The United States became a continent-spanning country through cunning, diplomacy, aggression, dumb luck, and derring-do–not to mention occasional chicanery. Writing with uncommon brio and without illusions, Richard Kluger brilliantly tells the epic tale of how these United States came to be.” --David M. Kennedy, author, Freedom from Fear and Pulitzer Prize winner

“This is a magisterial account of a monumental subject, nothing less than the acquisition and occupation of America. In Kluger's capable hands it is a story of courage and cunning, destiny and depravity, bravado and brutality, the defining themes of American history, dripping with irony.” --Joseph J. Ellis, author, Founding Brothers