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| John Adams | 
 enlarge | Author: David Mccullough
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Category: Book
List Price: $38.00
Buy New: $2.39
You Save: $35.61 (94%)
Buy New/Used/Collectible from $2.39
Avg. Customer Rating:  (787 reviews)
Sales Rank: 14434
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1st
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 752
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2
Dimensions (in): 9.4 x 6.1 x 2.1
ISBN: 0684813637
Dewey Decimal Number: 973.44092
EAN: 9780684813639
ASIN: 0684813637
Publication Date: May 22, 2001
Release Date: May 22, 2001
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 U.S.P.S. Top Sponsor For Making Movie of This Book~ December 4, 2008
Having read this book ~ and now seen the 5-part TV series based on David McCullough's book, John Adams, I am all the richer for it!
The obvious reason why the United States Postal Service sponsored and highly advertised this HBO miniseries last summer (2008)-are the thousands of letters sent (or not sent) between Abigail Adams and her endeared (or endured) husband, patriot, father of their 4 children during the tumultuous early years of the birth of our country and all through their married life. The letters are real and exist.
In letters, supposing we write what is on our hearts and minds (and often cannot express in spoken words). Now, imagine if your journals and diaries and personal letters became public domain after 225 years? Surely, your desires, hopes, mistakes and sentiments and faults would be clear to all. (Maybe that is why Jefferson destroyed alot of his.)
Lucky for us! Their letters still remain. Their correspondence stands testament to their intense love and devotion to each other as husband and wife with the heaviness of the burgeoning new-born United States in the background playing out in all its political and very real drama.
An amazing couple..yet, I would have a few questions for them, if they could come back to life.
1.)-Why did you seem to neglect your son, Charles, from an early age?
2.)-Why did you take that horrific political trip to France?
This book shows a human side of John Adams: his ongoing need to sacrifice his time with wife and family for service to the New Country. (He was purportedly gone from his family more years than he was home)
The results are documented in this book, along with snippets of their actual letters. Results for our country were for the better. And perhaps better in family-his older son John Quincy became President. For the worse-his other son, Charles died, I believe at the young age of 30 from drunkeness and debauchery; leaving the reader with the sense of parental neglect on his father's part.
All this amounts to a wonderful book of the influence of two lives wound and bound together by true human philial love in the midst of a whirlwind of chaotic birthpangs of our country. What amazes me, is the courage they had! Also Abigail's influence on Adams, her family and other great men of the day-is tremendous! You can almost see John and Abigail with clasped hands saying, 'For such a time as this,..we were made!'
And then McCullough captures the larger scope of Adams' having to endure the nagging questions, swirling doubts, rebellious children--not to mention the animosity of the early House Representatives, loss of friendships (his close friendship with Th. Jefferson cooled) alienation from Geo. Washington, nearly fatal sea voyages-and try to balance the Pre-Revolutionary Libertinism of France's court, the craziness of King George III (post-American Revolution) with his own ideals.
You get a sense John Adams and wife experienced real life just like the rest of us who aspire to something greater. And not only that, but you get the sense that Providence played a great part in their lives! Abigail openly gives credit to God for help.
The end of the book culminates expectedly with their end of life together-Abigail goes peacefully in death first. Then, on July 4, 1829--and this is the best part--John Adams AND Thomas Jefferson die only a few hours apart on the most conspicuous days of all days--Independence Day. The Providential Hand of God gives these two great men the most final...and fitting Tribute.
This is a MUST-read book. Thank you, Mr. McCullough, for fleshing out this couple's letters for us to read. Unfortunately, the final Episode #5 of the TV series leaves out this incredible, real-life ending.
Outstanding Read December 1, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is the type of book that destroys the belief that history is mostly boring. McCullough has a gift for making history real. Best book of any type I've read in a while.
David McCullough amazes me again November 25, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
I've read two other biographies by the same Pulitzer-prize-winning author, and his ability to turn correspondence and historical documents into living narratives still astounds me. John Adams was one of the Founding Fathers, and the issues he wrestled with are still important in American life today. Highly recommended.
Outstanding! November 19, 2008
0 out of 3 found this review helpful
I can't tell if this is about the guy who screwed George Washington out of a job or that guy who doesn't like to drink Merlot.
Illuminating November 17, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I'll be honest: prior to reading this book I knew precious little about John Adams. I assumed he was very much the "obnoxious and disliked" man portrayed in the musical 1776 who had the unfortunate task of following up George Washington as President. Yet having read David McCullough's book my viewpoint has changed thanks to this well written book.
With John Adams author David McCullough has brought one of the most overlooked founding fathers back to life. McCullough's book reads not like a biography but rather like a novel. Many biographies simply focus on the events of that person's life but not necessarily the influences upon them but that is something that McCullough does admirable. He does not simply tell us about Adams or his actions but traces the life of this amazing man.
McCullough does this is a number of ways. McCullough brings to life the various stages that Adams life played out upon with a skill usually reserved for novelists, the best examples being Philadelphia in the lead up to the Declaration being signed and Adams retirement. McCullough also makes the various people who populate the events of Adams life not just names (both famous and obscure) but true living people as well. Yet perhaps the biggest way that McCullough brings Adams to life is by making extensive use of the correspondence of Adams and his beloved wife Abigail. While Adams might be a founding father he was also a human being, an ordinary man in extraordinary times to evoke a cliche, and that is something that the correspondence that peepers the book makes clear.
With the skills of a novelist McCullough paints an amazing portrait of an amazing man. From studying the influences of Adams early life to bringing to life the various places Adams visited to the use of the correspondence of Adams and his wife Abigail, this is no ordinary biography. David McCullough's John Adams is the illumination of history and a highly readable biography.
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