These Truths: A Historical past of the US

“Nothing wanting a masterpiece.” —NPR Books

A New York Occasions Bestseller and a Washington Submit Notable E book of the 12 months

In probably the most bold one-volume American historical past in a long time, award-winning historian Jill Lepore affords a magisterial account of the origins and rise of a divided nation.

Extensively hailed for its “sweeping, sobering account of the American previous” (New York Occasions E book Overview), Jill Lepore’s one-volume historical past of America locations reality itself—a devotion to info, proof, and proof—on the middle of the nation’s historical past. The American experiment rests on three concepts—“these truths,” Jefferson known as them—political equality, pure rights, and the sovereignty of the individuals. However has the nation, and democracy itself, delivered on that promise?

These Truths tells this uniquely American story, starting in 1492, asking whether or not the course of occasions over greater than 5 centuries has confirmed the nation’s truths, or belied them. To reply that query, Lepore wrestles with the state of American politics, the legacy of slavery, the persistence of inequality, and the character of technological change. “A nation born in contradiction… will battle, without end, over the that means of its historical past,” Lepore writes, however partaking in that battle by learning the previous is a part of the work of citizenship. With These Truths, Lepore has produced a e-book that can form our view of American historical past for many years to return.