Revolutionary Roads

Searching for the War That Made America Independent...and All the Places It Could Have Gone Terribly Wrong

By: Bob Thompson

Narrated by: Fred Berman

In the ride-along tradition of Sarah Vowell, Tony Horwitz and Bill Bryson, this insightful history revisits the pivotal figures and key turning points of the American Revolutionary War.

Revolutionary Roads takes listeners on a time-traveling adventure through the crucial places American independence was won and might have been lost. You’ll ride shotgun with Bob Thompson as he puts more than 20,000 miles on his car, not to mention his legs; walks history-shaping battlefields from Georgia to Quebec; and hangs out with passionate lovers of revolutionary history whose vivid storytelling and deep knowledge of their subject enrich his own. Braiding these elements together into a wonderfully entertaining whole–and with a reporter’s abiding concern for getting the story straight–he has written an American Revolution book like no other.

The Revolutionary War is one of the greatest stories in all history, an eight-year epic filled with self-sacrificing heroes, self-interested villains, and, more interestingly, all the shades of complex humanity in between. It boasts large-scale gambles that sometimes paid off but usually didn’t, as well as countless tiny, fraught tipping points like a misunderstood order in a South Carolina cow pasture that could have altered the course of the war. The drama is magnified when you consider what was at stake: the fate of a social and political experiment that would transform the world. Yet we don’t know this story as well as we should, or how easily the ending could have changed.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2023 Bob Thompson (P)2023 Twelve

Critic reviews

"A splendid, entertaining meditation on the war that launched a nation. REVOLUTIONARY ROADS is a time machine, ready to transport any 21st century reader searching for our 18th century roots."—Rick Atkinson

"So many people don’t appreciate history anymore because they find the telling of it dry and uninteresting. Bob Thompson’s engaging writing style and gift for insightful analysis are a definite remedy for that. With a combination of solid historical research and good storytelling, Thompson brings life to the important figures and events of the American Revolutionary War."—Carl Borick

"REVOLUTIONARY ROADS is a superb book and a flat-out joy to read. It’s poignant, it’s funny, and it’s filled with surprising details about the lucky breaks and haunting decisions of the war that created America. Best of all is the enthusiasm Bob Thompson brings to the story. If you’re at all curious about the American Revolution–and we all should be, especially at this point in history–you couldn’t ask for a better guide and companion."—David Finkel, author of The Good Soldiers and Thank You For Your Service

Review

Lots of battles with too much detail. enthusiastic narrator. Learned some new facts. 3 more words.