The Ambassador: Joseph P. Kennedy at the Court of St. James’s 1938–1940

British American biographer Ronald (Condé Nast: The Man and His Empire) employs her transatlantic perspective in this unblinking narrative focusing on the ambassadorial years of a consequential founder of a political dynasty. Competitive, quick-tempered, ambitious, and financially brilliant, Joseph P. Kennedy (1888–1969) became the first Irish Catholic emissary to the United Kingdom from the United States. He intended this conspicuous position to clear a path to electing the first Irish Catholic U.S. president (either himself or one of his sons, he hoped). He also served the Franklin D. Roosevelt presidency by keeping the votes of his fellow Irish Catholics in the Democratic party column. Ronald spares readers the particulars about Kennedy’s extramarital affairs, beyond mentioning the names of some of his paramours. Instead, she meticulously details other activities of Kennedy—frequently absent, and holding both pro-Fascist and isolationist views—during a harrowing time in U.S. diplomacy. Mining the requisite primary source materials, Ronald concludes that Kennedy supplied the money and motivation to fuel his sons’ political campaigns. Readers might wish for more about the reactions of Kennedy’s children (especially daughter Eunice) to their father’s opinions. Ronald opines that Eunice’s exemplary work for disability advocacy may have been inspired by the neurological and mental illness of her sister Rosemary.