“He is the Roger Federer of historians.”
Daniel Okrent, Forbes
Reviews
THE CAUSE: THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION AND ITS DISCONTENTS
"Two of America's Leading Historians Look at the Nation's Founding Once Again - to Understand it in all its Complexity." Richard Stengel - New York Times
"The Cause' Review: Revolutionary Answers." Kathleen DuVal - Wall Street Journal
"Book Review: American Revolution gets a Fresh Look in The Cause." Michael L. Ramsey - The Roanoke Times
"The Cause, by Joseph J. Ellis." Joe Donahue - WAMC Roundtable Podcast
"The Cause,' by Joseph J. Ellis." Roger Bishop - Bookpage.com
"The Cause - Joseph Ellis Superbly Captures the Issues." Good Reads
"The True Character of the American Revolution: It's Complicated." Andres Burstein - Washington Post
AMERICAN DIALOGUE - THE FOUNDERS AND US
"Joe Ellis knows that history is not simply about the past, it's about the present having a conversation with the past. In this elegant and fascinating book, he conducts a discourse between our current troubled times and the period when our founders crafted our national creed. The result is an exploration of our values that is both timely and timeless." Walter Isaacson - Author of Leonardo Da Vinci
FIRST FAMILY: ABIGAIL AND JOHN ADAMS
"The best concise biography we have of John Adams - one that also gives Abigail her rightful place in the story and that is written with Ellis's usual clarity and verve." Publishers Weekly, February 2015
"A brilliant account of six years during with four Founding Fathers, "In disregard of public opinion, carried the American story in a new direction." Ellis delivers a convincing argument that it was a massive political transformation led by men with impeccable revolutionary credentials. This is Ellis' ninth consecutive hisotry of the Revolutionary War era and yet another winner." Gordon Wood - The New York Review of Books
"John Adams could not have a better biographer. "First Family" is an elegant addition . . . "
Annette Gordon-Reed - Los Angeles Times
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THE GREAT CONTRADICTION - THE TRAGIC SIDE OF THE AMERICAN FOUNDING
"As we approach the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Joseph J Ellis has given us a necessary correction to any would-be triumphant narratives of America's founding. Fluidly written and cogently argued, The Great Contradiction puts the failures to abolish slavery and to avoid Indian removal at the heart of the country's creation story -- failures that have shaped us to this day." Annette Gordon-Reed, Author of On Juneteenth
"The distinguished historian examines America's two original, foundational sins . . . . A provocative, revisionist view of the first years of the Republic." Kirkus
"Incisive . . . . A robustly complex portrait of the imperfect but dedicated shepherds of the first modern republic." Publishers Weekly