Britain at Bay: The Epic Story of the Second World War: 1938-1941

Shortlisted for The Duke of Wellington Medal for Military History 2021 A Times History Book of the Year ‘Britain’s wartime story has been told many times, but never as cleverly as this’ Dominic Sandbrook ‘Will make you think anew not just about the war, but about the Britain and Britons that fought it’ Daniel Todman ‘A bracing reminder of the power of brilliant history to make us reconsider what we think we know’ David Egerton In the bleak first half of the Second World War, Britain stood alone against the Axis forces. Isolated and outmanoeuvred, it seemed as though she might fall at any moment. Only an extraordinary effort of courage - by ordinary men and women - held the line. The Second World War is the defining experience of modern British history, a new Iliad for our own times. But, as Alan Allport reveals in this, the first part of a major new two-volume history, the real story was often very different from the myth that followed it. From the subtle moral calculus of appeasement to the febrile dusts of the Western Desert, Allport interrogates every aspect of the conflict - and exposes its echoes in our own age. Challenging orthodoxy and casting fresh light on famous events from Dunkirk to the Blitz, this is the real story of a clash between civilisations that remade the world in its image.