In this new collection of never-before-published essays, some of the world's brightest historians speculate about some of America's most intriguing crossroads. Spanning the years from independence to Watergate, What If? Three poses some irresistible questions and provides some brilliant answers.

Caleb Carr (The Alienist) asks what if there been no American Revolution; Tom Wicker discusses the first time a vice president, John Tyler, succeeded a deceased president and its surprising ramifications; Jay Winik (April 1865) explains the havoc that might have resulted if Booth had succeeded in his plan to assassinate Johnson and Seward as well as Lincoln; Antony Beevor (Stalingrad) entertains the possibility of Eisenhower's capture of Berlin before the Soviets' arrival there in 1945; and Robert Dallek (An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy 1917-1963) on one of the most agonizing American `what if's of all: what might have happened if JFK hadn't been assassinated.

Engaging, thought-provoking and convincingly argued, these essays shed new light on the most powerful nation in the world, and show us how the whole course of history can be altered by one single event.