When I was a girl, I had a comic book about the life of the newly elected president John F. Kennedy. One frame I always remembered with wonder depicted the Kennedy family at the table, their father at the head. It told that JFK’s father led mealtime discussions on political news and current events.

It was so unlike my experience, I had to marvel at such a father.

Well, over the years I have read biographies of President Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy and Ted Kennedy and learned more about that awesome father. Joseph P. Kennedy (JPK) taught his family core values, like loyalty to family comes first, and winning was everything–and that married men needn’t give up womanizing. His own life demonstrated these values. And, he was determined his son would become president, a revenge against anti-Catholic, anti-Irish prejudice he had encountered.

The Ambassador gave me all the details of how Kennedy used the ambassadorship to Britain to promote his own agenda and to propel his children into society. Kennedy was an isolationist; he didn’t want his sons in war, and he was convinced that another big war would destroy civilization. His primary concern was with economic stability and growth. Since the Nazis had brought economic security to the Germans, he didn’t see fascism as a problem. In fact, he said it was inevitable, even in the US, that capitalism had failed. As an anti-Semite, he was unconcerned about the plight of European Jews under the Nazis.

More than that, I learned that before he wanted his son to be president, Joseph P. Kennedy wanted to be president himself. And that is where his ambassadorship comes into the story. He had supported Franklin Roosevelt’s presidential bid, even self publishing a book about why people should vote for FDR. He expected a high governmental position as a reward. President Franklin D. Roosevelt knew JPK was only concerned about himself and would be a political rival. The ambassadorship was a reward that kept the troublesome JPK out of the states.

JPK was unequal to the task. His arrival in Britain was a media sensation; his defeatism alienated them. He bluntly spoke for himself, and not for the president. He was unable to feel compassion for the victims of Nazi Germany. He left his post for months, and moved into the countryside to avoid the Blitz. FDR couldn’t stand him. JPK blamed everyone else for his failings.

He was always the shrewd hard business man, & still thinks in terms of dollars against the terms of human feelings…Money & material things are of no account, in relation to life. The others can be replaced but not life. George VI on Joseph P. Kennedy, quoted in The Ambassador by Susan Ronald

The more I read, the more repugnant Kennedy became to me. How could Ronald have spent so much time with him?

It’s a well-rounded portrait, including Kennedy’s alliance with powerful and glamourous women, including Greta Garbo, Claire Booth Luce, and Marlena Dietrich. And the stories of his children’s experience in England is covered, including Kick falling in love and Rosemary finding a safe and loving haven.

Eldest son Joe Jr. was unimaginative and adopted his dad’s beliefs. As Ronald writes, had he become president, just imagine what would have happened when Joe McCarthy went on his anti-communist rampage? Luckily, the curious John F. Kennedy went his own way with his own insights.

And somehow, they all came from Joe Sr. By making a strong family, and providing the wealth to pursue politics, John became president, then Bobbie entered politics, and finally Ted, each son taking up his deceased brother’s mantle, carrying on his tradition and furthering the family’s legacy.

What a complicated, flawed, maddening, and amazing family they were.

I received an ARC from St. Martin’s Press. My review is fair and unbiased. ( )

For two years, Joseph P. Kennedy served as the Ambassador to Great Britain. He was there from 1938-1940, during a pivotal time in history. Hitler was gaining power and the political scene was tense.

At first, Kennedy was welcomed by the British, but soon he was treated as an outsider by both the British and the White House. He was not loyal to Roosevelt and often misrepresented the political situation regarding Hitler. His ego was such that he took no advice from others with more experience. He was an anti-Semite and sympathized with the Fascist party, both of which were not conducive to his position as Ambassador. His naïveté concerning Hitler was one of his failures as an Ambassador.

Kennedy was also unfaithful to his wife on numerous occasions. About the only positive thing about Kennedy was that he did love his children, especially his sons. He was exceptionally ambitious, and groomed his eldest son for a future presidency.

I grew weary of the political jockeying throughout the book as it often made for very dry reading. However, the personal aspects of Kennedy and the family were very interesting. I learned just enough about the family to encourage me to read more about them individually.

I highly recommend this one to history lovers and those fascinated with the Kennedy family. It was well researched and I found the footnotes as interesting as the book.

Many thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for allowing me to read an advanced copy and offer my honest review. ( )

This book will appeal to a very narrow audience as it's subject is very narrow. The subject is Joseph Kennedy (the patriarch of the Kennedy family) but only during the years 1938 - 1940 when he was FDR's ambassador to England during the period Hitler is building up to World War 2. Kennedy is portrayed as a foul mouthed loose cannon who is a isolationist to the bitter end. In part, this stance is fueled by his business interests and desire to keep his sons safe. The book drags in spots with too much specificity in but dedicated historians will find it interesting. ( )

Joseph Patrick Kennedy played many roles during his allotted time on the world’s stage: banker, motion picture producer, patriarch of a political dynasty, serial philanderer, real estate investor, stock broker and Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, among other activities. As the title of this book makes clear, author Susan Ronald focuses on Kennedy’s stint as American diplomat to the United Kingdom during the run up to World War II. In this part, he was an abject failure, for as Ronald shows through scrupulous scholarship, Joe Kennedy was temperamentally and intellectually unfit for the job. He was appointed to the position by then President Franklin Roosevelt as a political payoff for having brought in the Irish Catholic vote. As supported by copies footnotes and endnotes, the author makes abundantly clear why having your cronies in high places is generally a bad idea. Kennedy’s personality was equal parts ignorance and arrogance. He regularly upbraided his superiors, insulted his hosts and made many intemperate remarks to the mass media of his day, meaning newspapers and radio stations. Kennedy insisted that Great Britain was finished as a country and that the United States should stay out of any war by throwing the dictators of the world any bones they wanted (read: appeasement). Not only was Kennedy out of step with the aims of the Roosevelt administration, he actually got it into his head that he was the formulator of American foreign policy, rather than the conduit through which it was supposed to be implemented. Eventually sidelined and kept incommunicado, Kennedy resigned in disgust, which was just as well, as it relieved the President of the embarrassment of having to fire him outright.

Ronald’s writing style is clear and concise. She does a wonderful job of painting portraits with words. A number of features are particularly useful, especially for those not acquainted with this clan. A photographic family tree depicts the nine children of Joe and Rose, along with birth and death dates. “Dramatis Personae” gives thumbnail sketches of major characters discussed in the text. A list of abbreviations denotes the libraries, archives and document collections used in the writing of this book. All in all, this volume is extremely readable and informative. While it throws a harsh light on its subject – a staunch Roman Catholic who broke most of the Ten Commandments, a fascitst sympathizer, a defeatist, a manipulator of the stock market – Ronald is even-handed and non-judgmental. She presents the facts as she finds them, with ample citations to letters, diaries, newspaper articles and other written forms of documentation. This is a wonderful read for whomever wishes to learn more about the paterfamilias of America’s first family of politics. ( )

Even if, like myself, you feel you have an understanding of Kennedy family history, Susan Ronald's expose of Joe Senior's years as US Ambassador to the UK, as the War in Europe was percolating, will leave you dumbfounded. To gauge the extent of his perfidy, realize that FDR considered the damage he was doing to US policy as ambassador was minimal compared to that he would have done as an isolationist threat to the president's bid for a third term if he were in Washington. More depressing still are the uncritical assessments of their father by the Kennedy boys.

I at first felt Author and Subject a poor fit, not realizing that for Kennedy "High Society" was the pinnacle of, and confirmation of, success. Not a great book, and far too many words spent on the family, but if read selectively, for the moments on which our history was pivoting, very enlightening. ( )