From Booklist
Historians of Napolรฉon Bonaparte must assess his role in causing the wars named after him. Esdaile assigns heavy responsibility to the first consul and self-crowned emperor yet declines to analyze the period in exclusively personal terms. Rather, he develops the intersection between Napolรฉonโs militaristic proclivities and the international relations on which he dreamed of hammering his name into history. Much of Esdaileโs narrative recounts conflicting agendas of the European powers and dwells particularly on suspicions of Britain by Austria, Prussia, and Russia. In degrees, these powers all pursued their traditional foreign objectives, sparking several wars entirely unrelated to Franceโs territorial expansion. In consequence, France, spurred by its leaderโs lack of political restraint and thirst for conquest, was able to war advantageously against one or two powers at a time until the formation in 1813โ15 of the alliance that finally defeated Napolรฉon. Recapturing the flux of international diplomacy and Napolรฉonโs congenital rejection of compromise, Esdaile persuasively places the diplomatic foundation to popular military histories about the Napoleonic wars. --Gilbert Taylor
Review
"[A] masterly account of the Napoleonic wars . . . Makes the familiar story fresh."
-_The Economist_
"A joy to read . . . Attractive, well written and, on occasion, pleasantly idiosyncratic . . . A splendid book."
-_Literary Review_
"Deft, authoritative, often strikingly counterintuitive, this is the definitive word on the subject."
-_Telegraph_ (UK), Books of the Year