The lively, authoritative, New York Times bestselling biography of Abigail Adams.
This is the life of Abigail Adams, wife of patriot John Adams, who became the most influential woman in Revolutionary America. Rich with excerpts from her personal letters, Dearest Friend captures the public and private sides of this fascinating woman, who was both an advocate of slave emancipation and a burgeoning feminist, urging her husband to "Remember the Ladies" as he framed the laws of their new country.
John and Abigail Adams married for love. While John traveled in America and abroad to help forge a new nation, Abigail remained at home, raising four children, managing their estate, and writing letters to her beloved husband. Chronicling their remarkable fifty-four-year marriage, her blossoming feminism, her battles with loneliness, and her friendships with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, Dearest Friend paints a portrait of Abigail Adams as an intelligent, resourceful, and outspoken woman.
"Dearest Friend -- the Adamses' term for each other -- is most powerfully the history of a marriage, an 'Eleanor and Franklin' for the 18th century with one important difference: Their marriage worked."
Pauline Maier, The New York Times Book Review
"Withey has not only brought Abigail to life, she has also added new depth and richness to our understanding of the intricate history of feminist thought."
