John Adams

One of the best books I have read in years. I highly recommend it.

It's so much easier to learn & remember history when the writer allows you to become intimately involved with the subject and the period. David McCullough's writing is so personable, so charming, and so precisely informative that I walked away from this book with a deep appreciation of Adams and the time in which he lived. I believe McCullough could fascinate his readers even if he wrote about the telephone book! It was hard to put this book down, I always wanted to know what was coming next. His descriptions of time & place were very visual, putting the reader directly in the midst of the story -- seeing the colors, hearing the voices, feeling the tension, learning about small details. The people he writes about are recognizably human and vulnerable, yet the reader can't help but feel awe for what these people accomplished under such seemingly hopeless situations. One of my favorite history books!!

Much like his book on President Truman, Mr. McCullough has taken a frequently maligned historical figure and helped to burnish his place in history. Many of the books I have read about other great figures from that era always seemed to minimize John Adams contributions. Mr. McCullough is a gifted historian who makes all his subject matters come to life. The author shows how little has changed since the founding of our country when it comes to brilliant individuals willing to compromise their morals in the pursuit of winning in the political arena. It is a balanced, thought-provoking and highly entertaining biography. Well-worth reading even though the weight of this tome made my wrists sore.

I have been fascinated by John Adams ever since I first saw the movie "1776". Granted, I understand that William Daniels' portrayal had a great deal of dramatization for the sake of making a good story coloring it, but it always seemed to me that there was a fair amount of truth undergirding it as well. This book reinforces that opinion; I could frequently hear with my mind's ear Daniels' acerbic voice speaking the lines attributed to Adams. Granted, I am not a professional historian, so McCullough could easily have made much of this story up out of whole cloth and I'd have no way of detecting the deceit, but it has the feel of a thoroughly researched, carefully accurate tale. But more importantly, it is (to my mind, at least) reasonably well-balanced. Certainly, McCullough has tremendous respect and affection for his subject; most biographers do. But he doesn't fall into the trap that so many biographers fall into of omitting or glossing over the flaws in his subject. It is certainly possible that someone less well-inclined toward Adams might feel that he has minimized them, but no one can reasonably accuse him of ignoring them; Adams is portrayed in a very human light, and no one can read this book and feel that they saw an airbrushed picture of a perfect statesman. The ability to show a subject flaws and all while still invoking sympahy and respect is the mark of a truly fine biographer; McCullough does that.

Everyone knows Neil Armstrong was the first man to walk on the moon, but fewer people know Buzz Aldrin was second. Sir Edmund Hillary is famous for being the first to scale Mt. Everest, nobody knows Tenzig Norgay was second. It's the same for presidents. George Washington was the first president, and is rightly the most prominent Founding Father. Others, like Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson are on coins, monuments, and schools. John Adams played a key role in America's early years, but his biography isn't as familiar.

David McCullough's biography does a very good job of rectifying that wrong with this cradle-to-grave biography. Using the voluminous personal correspondance of Adams, Abigail Adams, and friends and family, McCullough can do a nice job of telling Adams' story. There's a few reasons why I give it four stars instead of five. I'd have preferred it if Adams' formation of a patriot was explained. It's like there were rumblings of revolution, and Adams signed right up. Why? Not every colonist did. In addition, Adams talkable nature is cited, but how did he get so influential in the Continental Congress? His growing influence is stated as fact in the book, but it would have been nice to explain why. Skipping forward a few years, my other complaint is how the power struggle between Hamilton and Adams was described. It's not quite clear how Hamilton thwarted Adams, or why. McCullough goes more into Jefferson and Adams' relationship, even though they spent much of Adams presidency not talking.

These few complaints besides, it's an engaging book, and I recommend it for anyone interested in a popular Revolutionary-era history.