From the bestselling author of Assassination Vacation and The Partly Cloudy Patriot, an insightful and unconventional account of George Washington’s trusted officer and friend, that swashbuckling teenage French aristocrat the Marquis de Lafayette. Chronicling General Lafayette’s years in Washington’s army, Vowell reflects on the ideals of the American Revolution versus the reality of the Revolutionary War. Riding shotgun with Lafayette, Vowell swerves from the high-minded debates of Independence Hall to the frozen wasteland of Valley Forge, from bloody battlefields to the Palace of Versailles, bumping into John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Lord Cornwallis, Benjamin Franklin, Marie Antoinette and various kings, Quakers and redcoats along the way. Drawn to the patriots’ war out of a lust for glory, Enlightenment ideas and the traditional French hatred for the British, young Lafayette crossed the Atlantic expecting to join forces with an undivided people, encountering instead fault lines between the Continental Congress and the Continental Army, rebel and loyalist inhabitants, and a conspiracy to fire George Washington, the one man holding together the rickety, seemingly doomed patriot cause. While Vowell’s yarn is full of the bickering and infighting that marks the American past—and present—her telling of the Revolution is just as much a story of friendship: between Washington and Lafayette, between the Americans and their French allies and, most of all between Lafayette and the American people. Coinciding with one of the most contentious presidential elections in American history, Vowell lingers over the elderly Lafayette’s sentimental return tour of America in 1824, when three fourths of the population of New York City turned out to welcome him ashore. As a Frenchman and the last surviving general of the Continental Army, Lafayette belonged to neither North nor South, to no political party or faction. He was a walking, talking reminder of the sacrifices and bravery of the revolutionary generation and what the founders hoped this country could be. His return was not just a reunion with his beloved Americans it was a reunion for Americans with their own astonishing, singular past. Vowell’s narrative look at our somewhat united states is humorous, irreverent and wholly original.

Winner of the 2015 American Library in Paris Book Award The Marquis de Lafayette at age nineteen volunteered to fight under George Washington and became the French hero of the American Revolution. In this major biography Laura Auricchio looks past the storybook hero and selfless champion of righteous causes who cast aside family and fortune to advance the transcendent aims of liberty and fully reveals a man driven by dreams of glory only to be felled by tragic, human weaknesses. Drawing on substantial new research conducted in libraries, archives, museums, and private homes in France and the United States, Auricchio, gives us history on a grand scale revealing the man and his complex life, while challenging and exploring the complicated myths that have surrounded his name for more than two centuries

This biography of French liberator Marquis de Lafayette (1757-1834) reveals not only how the nineteen-year-old bravely ventured to the infant United States to serve in its War of Independence, but also the iconoclast's enormous contribution to the causes of social and economic justice in France, Italy, Spain, Greece, and Poland. The Marquise (1759-1807), born Adrienne de Noailles, shared the same controversial beliefs as her husband, supporting and defending him wholeheartedly despite ongoing political persecution-including the Marquis's exile in an Austrian dungeon and her own imprisonment (and near-execution) by French radicals. Employing a sweeping, classical feel, and visiting landscapes including the magnificent court at Versailles, the brutal hardship of Valley Forge, and the momentous storming of the Bastille, Lane chronicles and celebrates the couple's passionate yet tumultuous relationship while documenting the birth of America, two French Revolutions, and the Napoleonic era.

Traces the life of the French nobleman who fought for democracy in revolutions in both the United States and France.

Society of School Librarians International Book Award Honor California Reading Association Eureka! Nonfiction Honor Bank Street College Best Children's Book of the Year Booklist Top Ten Biography for Youth Young fans of the smash Broadway hit "Hamilton" will enjoy this narrative nonfiction picture book story about the important friendship between George Washington and the Marquis de Lafayette during the Revolutionary War. Lafayette has come to America to offer his services to the patriotic cause. Inexperienced but dedicated, he is a much-needed ally and not only earns a military position with the Continental Army but also Washington's respect and admiration. This picture book presents the human side of history, revealing the bond between two famous Revolutionary figures. Both the author and illustrator worked with experts and primary sources to represent both patriots and the war accurately and fairly.

Acclaim for Lafayette "I found Mr. Unger's book exceptionally well done. It's an admirable account of the marquis's two revolutions-one might even say his two lives-the French and the American. It also captures the private Lafayette and his remarkable wife, Adrienne, in often moving detail." -Thomas Fleming, author, Liberty!: The American Revolution "Harlow Unger's Lafayette is a remarkable and dramatic account of a life as fully lived as it is possible to imagine, that of Gilbert de Motier, marquis de Lafayette. To American readers Unger's biography will provide a stark reminder of just how near run a thing was our War of Independence and the degree to which our forefathers' victory hinged on the help of our French allies, marshalled for George Washington by his 'adopted' son, Lafayette. But even more absorbing and much less well known to the general reader will be Unger's account of Lafayette's idealistic but naive efforts to plant the fruits of the American democracy he so admired in the unreceptive soil of his homeland. His inspired oratory produced not the constitutional democracy he sought but the bloody Jacobin excesses of the French Revolution."-Larry Collins, coauthor, Is Paris Burning? and O Jerusalem! "A lively and entertaining portrait of one of the most important supporting actors in the two revolutions that transformed the modern world."-Susan Dunn, author, Sister Revolutions: French Lightning, American Light "Harlow Unger has cornered the market on muses to emerge as America's most readable historian. His new biography of the marquis de Lafayette combines a thoroughgoing account of the age of revolution, a probing psychological study of a complex man, and a literary style that goes down like cream. A worthy successor to his splendid biography of Noah Webster."-Florence King, Contributing Editor, National Review "Enlightening! The picture of Lafayette's life is a window to eighteenth- and nineteenth-century history."-Michel Aubert La Fayette

Provides an account of the life and military career of the Marquis de Lafayette, a French aristocrat who, enamored with the ideals of the American Revolution, traveled to the colonies to join the fight for democracy, and became lifelong friends with George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.

Told for the first time in picture book form is the true story of James Lafayette—an enslaved person who spied for George Washington's army during the American Revolution. After his resounding defeat at the battle of Yorktown, British general Charles Cornwallis made a point of touring the American camp, looking for the reason behind his loss. What he didn’t expect to see was James, an escaped enslaved person who had served as a guide to the British army. Or at least that’s what Cornwallis was led to believe. In fact, James wasn’t actually a runaway—he was a spy for the American army. But while America celebrated its newfound freedom, James returned to slavery in Virginia. His service as a spy hadn't qualified him for the release he'd been hoping for. For James the fight wasn't over; his next adversary was the Virginia General Assembly. He'd already helped his country gain its freedom, now it was time to win his own.