A Cause Most Splendid: The Battle for the Bible

by Mark Alan Leslie

If the past teaches anything, its lesson is that religious freedom isn’t always free, and some men and women must risk all to preserve this freedom. The year is 1777. “Yours is a cause most splendid,” Robert Aitken is told. Despite the threat of prison or the hangman’s noose if caught, Congressional Journal and Common Sense publisher Aitken is determined to print much-needed Bibles for American colonial troops, churches, and families. The Royal Family alone has publishing rights to God’s Word, the British say, and any unauthorized printing of the King James Bible is not only illegal but a personal slap-in-the-face to the Sovereign. The penalty? The worst. Aitken’s “My King is the King of kings. To Him only will I answer.” And so, history is made.

372 pages, Paperback

Published November 14, 2021

About the author

A longtime journalist, Leslie has written 13 fiction and non-fiction books with more on the way..

Leslie's action-adventure-mystery, "Chasing the Music," released in May 2016, was the first of the Thrill of the Hunt series, which now includes "The Three Sixes" (2017) and "Operation Jeremiah's Jar" (2018).

His action-thriller, "The Last Aliyah," was released in spring 2018; his End Times adventure, "Torn Asunder," came out in 2020.

Leslie's newest historical fiction, "A Cause Most Splendid: The Battle for the Bible," the story of Robert Aitken's defiance of the king by illegally printing the Bible for American soldiers and colonists in 1778, was released in November 2021, joining three previous historical novels: "Midnight Rider for the Morning Star," based on the life and times of Francis Asbury, America's first circuit-riding preacher; "True North: Tice's Story" about a young slave's escape from Kentucky northeast through Massachusetts and Maine; and "The Crossing," about the Ku Klux Klan in Maine in the 1920s, was released in 2018

Leslie also has self-published a devotion, "Walks with God," and a self-help book, "Fired? Get Fired Up," both of which are available free on his web site: www.markalanleslie.com.

Also, he has written two ebooks about the golf industry. "Putting a Little Spin on It: The Design's the Thing!" contains the most insightful, humorous, and memorable quotes and stories from golf course icons and designers Leslie has interviewed over the years—from Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus to Gene Sarazen, Sam Snead, Ben Crenshaw, Gary Player, Pete Dye, Tom Fazio and scores of others.

His "Putting a Little Spin on It: The Grooming's the thing!" s filled with insights from the golf world's best and brightest golf course superintendents, builders and others working in the industry.