A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America

“In December 1776, a small boat delivered an old man to France.” So begins a dazzling narrative account of Benjamin Franklin's French mission, the most exacting-and momentous-eight years of his life.*

When Franklin embarked, the colonies were without money, munitions, gunpowder, or common cause; like all adolescents, they were to discover that there was a difference between declaring independence and achieving it. To close that gap Franklin was dispatched to Paris, amid great secrecy, across...