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This book was the October selection for my book club, and I probably would not have read it otherwise. It is obviously well researched, and the author includes his own journey to access the Dumas family documents even after the keeper of the documents (and the code for the lock) passes away. Alexandre Dumas who we all know as the author had a legendary father who was well known in the French military but because of his ethnicity and competition with Napoleon, has lost attention over the years.

I wish I had read The Count of Monte Cristo first, because much of the character and adventures of the count are based on Dumas's father's actual life. He was a soldier of legend, able to take out the enemy and outsmart his foes beyond what could normally be expected. His invasion into the Alps in impossible weather feels like the stuff of superheros or myth but Reiss goes back to find the paper trail for these events in history.

I learned more about post-revolution France, and its relation with the foundling USA in its early days of revolution and nationhood. It was also interesting to read about how French philosophers/politicians were able to outlaw slavery, paving the way for people like Alex Dumas and other sons of rich land owners to receive excellent schooling and serve in leadership roles in the military; then to see these respected thinkers' views of slavery in America. But even they were overturned, for when Napoleon took control back in France (with his newly established Italian regions, largely won by Dumas's leadership) and banned people with any African descent from living within a certain radius of Paris, of owning property, and reinstated slavery within the empire.

I was most engaged in the beginning (with the story of Dumas and early Haiti) and the end (post-war) but I will never enjoy reading about military strategy, sorry. If you do, you will like this book. The research and story that must be told are 5 stars; my experience in actually reading it is 3 (which I feel I need to remind you is fine, good even, but not a favorite.)