Over the years, the story of the Plymouth Colony has degraded into a threadbare tableau about a single hard Massachusetts winter that dissolves into a cheery Pilgrim-Indian feast. That crude cartoon will collapse under the sheer force of this epic tale of violence penned by the author of the National Book Award-winning In the Heart of the Sea. Nathaniel Philbrick's narrative tracks the Pilgrims from their perilous 1620 transatlantic crossing to the bloody battles of King Philip's War (1675-76). With compelling detail, he describes the delicate social ecology achieved by the Pilgrims and Native Americans before it was broken by a deadly war of attrition. His carefully modulated story blends acts of settler courage and kindness with those of savagery and cowardice. A major nonfiction work.