America First, by H.W. Brands

Pulitzer Prize finalist and New York Times bestselling historian H.W. Brands: AMERICA FIRST: Roosevelt vs. Lindbergh in the Shadow of War (September 24, 2024).

Brands is a world-renowned historian known for his storytelling prowess and dynamic dual biographies, featuring key figures such as William Tecumseh Sherman and Geronimo, John Brown and Abraham Lincoln, and Douglas MacArthur and Harry Truman. In AMERICA FIRST, Brands turns his vivid lens to the fierce debate between President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and world-famous aviator Charles Lindbergh over America’s role in world affairs.

AMERICA FIRST kick offs in the 1930s as fascism is taking root in Europe. Across the globe, tension is high, reaching a boiling point with Hitler’s invasion of Poland in 1939. As the European continent braces for war, many Americans are still smarting from World War I, and they are reluctant to get involved in another bloody conflict across the Atlantic. Yet President Franklin Roosevelt recognizes that Hitler’s threat goes beyond the democracies in mainland Europe and that even an ocean won’t protect the U.S. from Hitler’s aggression. In order to convince a wary nation to go to war, FDR must square up against a vocal isolationist camp, led by Charles Lindbergh. Handsome, accomplished, Lindbergh uses his platform to encourage “Americanism” at every turn, becoming the nominal head of the America First Committee and Germany’s most respectable defender—and a major obstacle to FDR. Brands has been praised for writing “with a novelist’s feel for pacing and detail” (Wall Street Journal) and he brings this sensibility to AMERICA FIRST, capturing this high-stakes showdown in an account that is both highly researched and readable.