Play Audiobook Sample
The Guns at Last Light (Abridged): The War in Western Europe, 1944-1945 Audiobook
Play Audiobook Sample
(5.00) - 1 listener ratings
Quick Stats About this Audiobook
Total Audiobook Chapters:
Longest Chapter Length:
Shortest Chapter Length:
Average Chapter Length:
Audiobooks by this Author:
![D-Day: The Invasion of Normandy, 1944 [The Young Readers Adaptation] Audibook, by Rick Atkinson](https://media.audiobookstore.com/b/c/bcd2/bcd2-square-240.jpg)
![Battle of the Bulge [The Young Readers Adaptation]: The Young Readers Adaptation Audibook, by Rick Atkinson](https://media.audiobookstore.com/b/n/bn31/bn31-square-240.jpg)
Publisher Description
The eagerly awaited final volume in Pulitzer Prize-winner Rick Atkinson's New York Times bestselling Liberation Trilogy.
It is the twentieth century’s unrivaled epic: at a staggering price, the United States and its allies liberated Europe and vanquished Hitler. In the first two volumes of his bestselling Liberation Trilogy, Rick Atkinson recounted the history of how the American-led coalition fought its way from North Africa and Italy to the threshold of victory. Now he tells the most ?dramatic story of all—the titanic battle in Western Europe.
D-Day marked the commencement of the war’s final campaign, and Atkinson’s astonishingly fresh account of that enormous gamble sets the pace for the masterly narrative that follows. The brutal fight in Normandy, the liberation of Paris, the disaster that was Market Garden, the horrific Battle of the Bulge, and finally the thrust to the heart of the Third Reich—all these historic moments come utterly alive. Atkinson tells the tale from the perspective of participants at all levels, from presidents and prime?ministers to ambitious generals, from war-weary lieutenants to terrified teenage riflemen. When Germany at last surrenders, we understand anew both the devastating cost of this global conflagration and the awe-inspiring effort that led to Germany’s?surrender.
With the stirring final volume of this monumental trilogy, Rick Atkinson’s remarkable accomplishment is manifest. He has produced the definitive chronicle of the war that restored freedom to the West. His lively, occasionally lyric prose brings the vast theater of battle, from the beaches of Normandy deep into Germany, brilliantly alive. It is hard to imagine a better history of the western front’s final phase.
Download and start listening now!
“The same qualitiesthat garnered Atkinson a Pulitzer Prize for An Army at Dawn—meticulous research married to masterful narrative—areapparent in The Guns at Last Light. The new book relates the oft-told (but never better) storyof the war’s final year, from D-Day to the German surrender.”
— Chicago Tribune
Quotes
-
“A remarkable conclusion to his three parts on WWII…A fabulous book.”
— Tom Brokaw -
“Detailed in its research, unsparing in its judgments and confident in its prose…This trilogy—on which [Atkinson has] spent twelve years, twice as long as the war itself—may well be his masterpiece.”
— Time -
“A tapestry of fabulous richness and complexity… Atkinson is a master of what might be called ‘pointillism history,’ assembling the small dots of pure color into a vivid, tumbling narrative…The Liberation Trilogy is a monumental achievement, about 2,500 pages in all, densely researched but supremely readable.”
— New York Times Book Review -
“A magnificent book…Though the story may seem familiar, I found surprising detail on every page…Atkinson’s account of D-Day is both masterly and lyrical… [He] is an absolute master of his material.”
— Wall Street Journal -
“Breathtaking, unforgettable… Atkinson provides us with especially poignant descriptions in a blaze of writing and research that matches the drama and significance of the moment, all without peer in modern history…This volume is a literary triumph worthy of the military triumph it explores and explains.”
— Boston Globe -
“Monumental… As befits a journalist who knows his material inside and out, Atkinson can provide the incisive explanation to a complex situation or personage… A masterpiece of deep reporting and powerful storytelling.”
— Los Angeles Times -
“[Atkinson] reconstructs the period from D-Day to V-E Day by weaving a multitude of tiny details into a tapestry of achingly sublime prose…With great sensitivity, Atkinson conveys the horrible reality of what soldiers had to become to defeat Hitler’s Germany.”
— Washington Post -
“Great characters, vivid details…The final volume of Rick Atkinson’s ‘Liberation Trilogy’ proves again that few can re-tell a story as well as he.”
— USA Today -
“A beautifully written, moving account of one of the most bittersweet chapters in modern history.”
— Smithsonian
Awards
-
A Booklist Top 10 in June 2013
-
A USA Today bestseller
-
A Washington Post bestseller
-
A #1 New York Times bestseller
-
A 2013 Chicago Tribune Noteworthy Book for Nonfiction
-
New York Times Book Review 100 Notable Books, 2013
-
A Los Angeles Times bestseller
-
A 2013 Washington Post Top 10 Book
-
A Publishers Weekly bestseller
-
A Wall Street Journal bestseller
-
An NPR bestseller
-
A 2013 BookPage Best Book
The Guns at Last Light Listener Reviews
-
—
Angelique Craney, 11/29/2022
About Rick Atkinson
Rick Atkinson, a former staff writer and senior editor at the Washington Post, is the highly acclaimed author of several books of military history. An Army at Dawn won the Pulitzer Prize for History, and The Guns at Last Light was a #1 New York Times bestseller. Among his many accolades and awards are the George Polk Award, the Pritzker Military Library Literature Award, the Samuel Eliot Morison Prize, the Society for Military History Distinguished Book Award, the Axel Springer Prize, and the Henry Adams Prize, among others.