From Publishers Weekly

In this debut, lawyer and academic Paul examines three critical but forgotten characters of the American Revolution. The merchant is American Silas Deane, a Connecticut man sent to France by Congress to broker an alliance and arms treaty for the Continental Army. The playwright is a Frenchman named Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, author of The Barber of Seville, who saw the Revolution as an opportunity for profit. The spy is the colorful Chevalier d'Eon, who worked for Louis XV, and threatened to provoke war with England after Louis XVI came to power, using old letters that outlined a plan to invade London. Beaumarchais was tasked with retrieving those letters from the Chevalier before Louis XVI would provide funds to arm the Americans. Once secured, Beaumarchais worked with Deane to import arms, and other trade goods, without raising the suspicions of the British. Paul's 18th century is highly detailed, but most striking is how little war profiteering has changed in 200-plus years, complete with Congressional infighting among honest lawmakers and those using the system for personal gain. Examining the Revolutionary War through three disparate figures, Paul reveals just how close the wealthiest colonists came to replacing one oppressive aristocracy with another.
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Review

"Rollicking and surprising, this is history as it really happened - as it was made by all-too-human actors. Unlikely Allies is a lively read and an important counterpoint to Founder hagiography."
-Evan Thomas, bestselling author of John Paul Jones

"An engaging and entertaining account of three of the most colorful characters involved in the American Revolution. It is hard to believe that their story is true, but it is."
-Gordon S. Wood, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Radicalism of the American Revolution

"_Unlikely Allies_ is an amazing story compellingly told. I kept turning the pages in eagerness to find out what would happen next. Conspiracies abounded, and hardly anyone was what he or she seemed. If the eighteenth century in Europe was an era of Enlightenment, it was also an Age of Deception. Yet thanks to Joel Paul's sympathetic portrayal, Silas Deane emerges as an unsung hero of the American Revolution."
-Robert A. Gross, Bancroft Prize-winning author of The Minutemen and Their World

"Ever tire of worshipful accounts of the Founding Fathers' wisdom and fortitude? Then try this wonderful book about how an American businessman and two Frenchmen, a dramatist and a spy, came to their aid. A rollicking romp as well as a serious history, it reminds us of the role of duplicity, hypocrisy and corruption, and of human frailty and chance, in safeguarding the American revolution."
-William Taubman, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Khrushchev: The Man and His Era