Al Murray's 'insightful' Second World War history book pre-empted by Headline

Headline has pre-empted Command How the Allies Learned to Win the Second World War by comedian and presenter Al Murray.     

Non-fiction publisher Iain MacGregor acquired world rights from Avalon. It will be published in hardback, e-book and audio in October 2022.  

Murray’s passion for military history and the Second World War has led to acclaimed television shows and his podcast "We Have Ways of Making You Talk" with co-host and bestselling author James Holland. Command will mark Murray’s first serious history narrative examining the key military leaders in the Second World War.  

MacGregor commented: “I have been a fan of Al’s work for many years but it was only listening to his episode of BBC Radio 4’s ’Great Lives’ that I realised what passion he has for history and for the Second World War. His in-depth discussion of Field Marshal Montgomery had Al display a vast knowledge of the military leader himself, but also the events of the Second World War. Al has since gone on to co-host with James Holland possibly the UK’s most successful military history podcast ’We Have Ways of Making You Talk’ which in two years has achieved over 10 million downloads. He now wants to showcase his knowledge and love of the subject by writing this insightful and entertaining analysis of the great allied military leaders in the war.” 

Murray added: “Why am I so interested? Because, as we’ve very clearly seen in recent times, crisis reveals character in every way imaginable and the Second World War offers the historian the biggest crisis in human history. With Command I will try to tell the story of how the war progressed from the British and American perspective, using some of the leading allied combat commanders – and several that are less prominent – to tell the story of how the West got its act together in its efforts to defeat Nazi Germany, and what that tells us about the characters and the challenges that faced them.”