The Ride: Paul Revere and the Night That Saved America

USA Today Bestseller

Timed for the 250th anniversary of one of America's most famous founding events: Paul Revere's heroic ride, newly told with fresh research into little-known aspects of the story Americans have heard since childhood but hardly understood

On April 18, 1775, a Boston-based silversmith, engraver, and anti-British political operative named Paul Revere set out on a borrowed horse to fulfill a dangerous but crucial mission: to alert American colonists of advancing British troops, which would seek to crush their nascent revolt.

Revere was not the only rider that night, and indeed, he had completed at least 18 previous rides across New England and other colonies, disseminating intelligence about British movements. But this ride was like no other, and its consequences in the months and years to come--as the American Revolution morphed from isolated skirmishes to a full-fledged war--became one of our founding legends.

In The Ride, Kostya Kennedy presents a dramatic new narrative of the events of April 18 and 19, 1775, informed by fresh primary and secondary source research into archives, family letters and diaries, contemporary accounts, and more. Kennedy reveals Revere's ride to be more complex than it is usually portrayed--a loosely coordinated series of rides by numerous men, near-disaster, capture by British forces, and finally success. While Revere was central to the ride and its plotting, Kennedy reveals the other men (and, perhaps, a woman with information about the movement of British forces) who helped to set in motion the events that would lead to America's independence.

Thrillingly written in a dramatic, unstoppable narrative, The Ride re-tells an essential American story for a new generation of readers.

Author: Kostya Kennedy
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 03/25/2025
Pages: 304
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.85lbs
Size: 8.30h x 5.40w x 1.30d
ISBN: 9781250341372


Review Citation(s):
Library Journal 02/01/2025 pg. 10
Publishers Weekly 01/27/2025
Kirkus Reviews 02/01/2025
Booklist 02/01/2025 pg. 21
BookPage 04/01/2025

About the Author
KOSTYA KENNEDY is the Editor in Chief of Premium Publishing at People Inc. A former Senior Writer and Editor at Sports Illustrated, he is the author of True: The Four Seasons of Jackie Robinson as well as the New York Times bestsellers 56: Joe DiMaggio and the Last Magic Number in Sports and Pete Rose: An American Dilemma. All three books won the CASEY Award for Best Baseball Book of the Year. He has taught at Columbia and New York University, and he lives in Westchester County, New York.