The Black Count - Tom Reiss - A Short Summary & Review
The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal and The Real Count of Monte Cristo - Tom Reiss - A Short Summary & Review
By: a.d. elliott | Take the Back Roads - Art and Other Odd Adventures
A Rite of Fancy Book Recommendation and Review
A short summary:
Written by Tom Reiss, The Black Count tells the remarkable, and long-overlooked, story of Alexandre Dumas, the father of novelist Alexandre Dumas père and the real-life inspiration behind swashbuckling heroes like D’Artagnan and Edmond Dantès.
Born enslaved in the Caribbean and rising to become the highest-ranking Black general in Europe, Dumas was a military prodigy of the French Revolution, brilliant, principled, and fearless. Reiss chronicles Dumas’s extraordinary ascent, his battlefield heroics, and his unwavering moral code, which ultimately brought him into conflict with Napoleon Bonaparte.
The book also exposes how race, politics, and retaliation erased Dumas from official memory. His downfall was not due to a lack of merit, but to shifting power dynamics and the prejudices of those who survived to write history.
My favorite quote from the book:
Questions to ponder while reading:
My review:
Reading this book feels like uncovering a buried truth.
Now we know who inspired characters like D’Artagnan, and it’s not hard to see why. Alexandre Dumas’s life was larger than fiction: brave to the point of recklessness, loyal to principle over ambition, and unwilling to compromise his humanity for power.
The Black Count is also a blunt reminder that history is often written by political survivors rather than moral heroes. Dumas’s refusal to participate in cruelty and conquest cost him advancement, favor, and ultimately his place in the official narrative.
And yes, shame on Napoleon. Reiss makes clear that Napoleon’s racial backsliding and consolidation of power not only betrayed revolutionary ideals but also deliberately sidelined men like Dumas who embodied them too fully.
This book restores a man to memory. That act alone makes it essential reading.
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About the Author
a.d. elliott is a wanderer, photographer, and storyteller traveling through life
She shares her journeys at Take the Back Roads, explores new reads at Rite of Fancy, and highlights U.S. military biographies at Everyday Patriot.
You can also browse her online photography gallery at shop.takethebackroads.com.
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