Her book "" was serialised in five parts in "The New Yorker" in its newly-created "Annals of War" series starting in July 1972 earning her a Special Front Page Award. "Fire in the Lake" was met with great acclaim when it was published in August 1972 and won the 1973 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction, the Bancroft Prize for history, and the U.S. National Book Award in Contemporary Affairs.There was a "Contemporary" or "Current" award category from 1972 to 1980.</ref> The book cautioned that the United States did not understand the history and culture of Vietnam and it warned about American involvement there.