Brendan’s Alternate Tagline for The Last Adieu:
It was one hell of an adieu.
Quick synopsis:
The story of when the Marquis Lafayette returned to America decades after the revolution.
Fact for Non-History People:
Lafayette was commissioned a major general at the age of 19.
Fact for History Nerds:
Lafayette drafted the influential Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen with Thomas Jefferson providing input.
My Take on The Last Adieu:
Admittedly, I am probably not a great reviewer for Ryan Cole’s The Last Adieu. Not because I don’t find the Marquis de Lafayette fascinating, but because I am a Lafayette superfan. As such, there wasn’t going to be much that I didn’t already know. It’s not a flex (ok, it’s a little bit of a nerd flex). It’s just that this piece of information is important to you, dear reader, to decide whether or not the rest of this review applies to you.
Cole is focusing mostly on the Marquis’s return to the U.S. decades after the American Revolution. For the uninitiated, this tour of the U.S. was a national celebration on steroids that were on more steroids. Lafayette was as close to universally beloved (in the U.S., France not so much) and his visit was an event wherever he stepped foot.
Cole writes well, and I can’t really criticize anything in the narrative by itself. I would say that the book is just a tad long. At around 400 pages, there is a lot of room for tangents. Also, all the background for Lafayette and the state of the U.S. at this time takes up the first 100 pages. If you don’t know Lafayette’s life, it will seem like a lot of interesting stuff is zipped through to get to the tour. While epic, 300 pages for his travels starts to drag a bit as more and more people are quickly introduced and then will inevitably disappear from the narrative. This is just the nature of this particular story, and I think Cole handles is as well as can be expected.
(This book was provided as an advance copy by NetGalley and Harper Horizon.)
Verdict:
Well worth your time. Buy it here!
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