The Gun, the Ship and the Pen'If there were a Nobel Prize in History, Colley would be my nominee' Jill Lepore, New Yorker 'One of the most exciting historians of her generation, but also one of the most interesting writers of non fiction around' William Dalrymple, Guardian 'Colley takes you on intellectual journeys you wouldn't think to take on your own, and when you arrive you wonder that you never did it before' David Aaronovitch, The Times Starting not with the United States,