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There are currently 11 reader reviews for Angelica
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Bettie_Tullis
More than Hamilton's sister-in-law
Angelica: For Love and Country in a Time of Revolution by Molly Beer is an interesting biography of one of our country's earliest celebrities. Born in 1756 to wealthy parents of Dutch heritage in colonial New York, we get a window onto what privileges and obstacles a girl (and later a woman) of her class, culture and times would have experienced.
As she matured during the American Revolution, though women's opportunities were limited, Angelica Schuyler Church, as the daughter of a general, was exposed to many of the iconic personages and scenes from our history textbooks, from George Washington to Marie Antoinette. (Angelica's husband, John Church negotiated supplies for the French army when they came to the colonist's aid and the Church's later lived in Paris as well as England). She was far more than the flirtatious sister-in-law of Alexander Hamilton as depicted in the musical Hamilton.
Her thoughtful correspondence to not only her family but to other influential friends like Thomas Jefferson, for example, has been preserved and well-used by our author, who, by the way, claims Angelica, New York as her home town, a town developed by Angelica's son, and where she later lived at the end of her life. I, not a historian, came away with a better understanding of much of our past, including not only the Revolution but the circumstances involved with Britain's later recognition of the United States as a nation and even the Louisiana Purchase. Angelica's interests and influences were widespread.
I think a book group who enjoys history and women's issues would find a lot to discuss. It is not a long tome, less than 300 pages but well-researched. My only real criticism is that we were too-often reminded of the irony that the fight for liberty was not enjoyed by women nor blacks.
Stephanie K. (Glendale, AZ)
Angel of the American Revolution
"Angelica" by Molly Beer, written in the contexts of the American Revolution, the French and British War of 1790 and the French Revolution, relates an American woman's tale of survival of not simply one but three wars. Throughout, she manages to become the silent, true-life confidante of such political luminaries as John Jay, Alexander Hamilton, Ben Franklin and George Washington.
As women didn't have the vote and in general weren't even permitted to discuss politics in public without censure and possibly jail, Angelica Church was an anomaly and a leader among the women of her time. Those with a penchant for American history will learn much that they never had any idea of through Angelica's voluminous written correspondences.
Living in the American colonies/United States, England and France at various points, she was a diplomat's diplomat without ever having held an official post. Readers will enjoy the way she deftly combines law, finance and diplomacy and joins it with a healthy dollop of gossip at the highest levels to construct political relationships. She takes a women's tendency for building warm friendships and applies it to the chaotic times she was born into to produce her own unique take on history. You'll never again see American history in the same light after reading the educational and touching "Angelica."
Ellen C. (Boca Raton, FL)
Very dry
I had been looking forward to reading this book because I lived in the area where this book takes place. I really tried to finish this book, but it was too much like a high school history textbook. The author does include side comments, which are interesting, sometimes humorous, and some information about daily life and routine happenings.
But for the most part, it seemed to be a list of activities that the heroine does. I never got a sense of why the heroine does the things she does. She meets people, but the information is not developed as to what happens. I needed more of a story.
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