A graduate of King’s College, Cambridge, with a master’s degree from Columbia University, Nick Bunker has had a diverse career in finance and journalism. His book An Empire on the Edge was a Finalist for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize in History and the winner of the 2015 George Washington Prize. A former investment banker and reporter for the Financial Times, he now lives with his wife, Susan, in Lincolnshire, England.
“One opens this book with a weary sense of resignation. More
hagiography about national origins? Another group of founders? The
Pilgrims? The Mayflower? The Compact? The first Thanksgiving? A
‘new history’? Please! Enough already. And yet . . . it’s not like
that, not at all. To the contrary, Nick Bunker offers a remarkably
fresh take on (it’s true) an old and well-worn story. . .
. The evidence . . . adds up to a picture so full and vivid as
to constitute a virtual ground-level tour of an otherwise lost
world.” —The Washington Post
“A meticulous exploration of the lives of the Pilgrims before they
even set sail. . . . It’s a comprehensive work of genius and a
delight to read.” —GalleyCat.com
“A wonderfully engaging study. . . . There is so much here that is
fresh and invigorating that Making Haste from Babylon will seem to
some lovers of early American history a real page-turner with new
readings and perceptive takes in each chapter. Bunker has written
that rarest of books—a scholarly history with all the narrative
punch of a novel.” —The Providence Journal
"Nick Bunker’s thorougly researched new history digs deeper than
previous accounts. . . . Making Haste from Babylon is a remarkable
tour de force destined to become an indispensible resource for
in-depth understanding of the colonial experience in New England."
–Historical Journal of Massachusetts
“Bunker . . . is simply a marvelous writer with a nose for the
fascinating anecdote. . . . There’s some intriguing fact or story
on every page . . . so much of Making Haste from Babylon [is] rich
in the thrill of brushing up against the past and its fathomless
mysteries.” —Salon.com
“A bold work of revisionism.” —Harper’s Magazine
“Making Haste from Babylon is essential reading for those who think
they know the story of the Pilgrims. . . . All this and more Bunker
relates with enviable concision and verve.” —BBC History
Magazine
“Prodigious . . . [Bunker’s] vivid style and bold analysis infuse
this book with colour and pace, and the result is an indispensable
contribution to understanding how it all began.” —Literary
Review
"This superb book secures for the Pilgrims their iconic perch among
the earliest founders of colonial America. Bunker…has succeeded in
writing a major history, unprecedented in its sweep, of the
Plymouth Colony. . . . Never before has such a comprehensive and
thoroughly researched study of the subject appeared. . . . The
results are stunning. Certain to be the dominating work on the
Pilgrims for decades.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Nick Bunker has done the seemingly impossible: he has shed new
light on the oldest of stories, the epic of the Pilgrims'
experience in the Old and New Worlds. With graceful writing
and diligent scholarship, he has given us an engaging and original
book.” —Jon Meacham
“I have rarely read a book which combines such a breadth of
canvas...with such penetrating and detailed research.” —Patrick
Collinson, Professor of Modern History, Cambridge University
(emeritus)
“In this beautifully written and imagined book, impeccably
researched, and full of so many fresh insights and
discoveries, Nick Bunker has given us the most
grounded and convincing portrait yet achieved of what drove
the Pilgrim Fathers to seek their faith and fortune in the New
World. . . . Combining intensive archive research with a time
traveler’s eye he conjures a wonderfully evocative
sense of place. . . . It is a fabulous tale of our ancestors,
but also the true founding moment of America.” —Michael Wood,
British historian, documentary filmmaker, and broadcaster
Ask a Question About this Product More... |