'Most Blessed of the Patriarchs': Thomas Jefferson and the Empire of the Imagination, Paperback/Annette Gordon-Reed

Hailed by critics and embraced by readers, "Most Blessed of the Patriarchs" is one of the richest and most insightful accounts of Thomas Jefferson in a generation. Following her Pulitzer Prize-winning The Hemingses of Monticello , Annette Gordon-Reed has teamed with Peter S. Onuf to present a provocative and absorbing character study, "a fresh and layered analysis" ( New York Times Book Review ) that reveals our third president as "a dynamic, complex and oftentimes contradictory human being" ( Chicago Tribune ). Gordon-Reed and Onuf fundamentally challenge much of what we thought we knew, and through their painstaking research and vivid prose create a portrait of Jefferson, as he might have painted himself, one "comprised of equal parts sun and shadow" (Jane Kamensky).