The Crossing Books in Order

The Crossing is Howard Fast's Revolutionary War sequence, built around the difficult winter of 1776 and the people who fought before the American victory was anything close to certain. The central novel, The Crossing, follows George Washington's army as it prepares for the dangerous Delaware River crossing that led to the attack on Trenton.

Fast does not treat the event as a distant monument. He pays attention to exhausted soldiers, local men, political arguments, cold weather, poor supplies, and the uncertainty facing commanders who know the revolution could fail. Washington is important, but the story also makes room for the people around him whose choices make the operation possible.

The tone is tense and grounded. The army is battered, enlistments are ending, and morale is low. The crossing is not presented as an easy, preordained triumph. It is a calculated risk taken by people who have very few good options left.

Bunker Hill serves as a prequel. It moves back to the early fighting around Boston and shows the civilian volunteers, militia members, and political organizers drawn into the opening phase of the war. Together, the two books frame the revolution from its first violent clashes through one of its most famous turning points.

Fast wrote several novels about the era, including Conceived in Liberty, The Unvanquished, April Morning, and The Hessian. The Crossing books stand apart because they focus on connected military moments and on Washington's struggle to keep an army, and a cause, alive.

History is made by frightened people doing difficult work.

Begin with Bunker Hill if you want chronological story time, then read The Crossing. Begin with The Crossing if you want to follow Fast's original entry point into this two-book sequence. Either way, the books suit readers who want historical fiction with battlefield pressure, political stakes, and ordinary people caught in a revolution.