The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal, and the Real Count of Monte Cristo

Tom Reiss
921 Dumas Rei


General Alex Dumas is a man almost unknown today, but his son, the novelist Alexandre Dumas, used his larger-than-life feats as inspiration for The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers. But, hidden behind General Dumas's swashbuckling adventures was an even more incredible secret: he was the son of a Black slave—who rose higher in the white world than any man of his race would before our own time.

Celebrate Black Voices

  • Finding Me


  • Unprotected: A Memoir


  • The Sisterhood:  How a Network of Black Women Writers Changed American Culture


  • The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal, and the Real Count of Monte Cristo


  • The Art of Ruth E. Carter: Costuming Black History and the Afrofuture, from Do the Right Thing to Black Panther


  • I Always Knew: A Memoir


  • The Black Period: On Personhood, Race, and Origin


  • Master Slave Husband Wife: An Epic Journey from Slavery to Freedom


  • King: A Life


  • The Marathon Don't Stop: The Life and Times of Nipsey Hussle


  • Black Fortunes: The Story of the First Six African Americans who Escaped Slavery and Became Millionaires