A Story of the Impact of Fathers on Their Sons

Winston Churchill was neglected by his parents. He desperately wanted a relationship with his father, but could never please him. The desire for paternal acceptance colored his life and underlay his treatment of his own son. Because of his strained relationship with his father, Winston indulged his son Randolph to the point of spoiling him.

The Churchill men were alike in having many outstanding qualities, but there were also dark sides to their personalities. Both men were charismatic and brilliant speakers. Both had terrible tempers and a fondness for alcohol that sometimes went too far.

Although the book doesn’t present new facts about the relationship between Winston and his son, it paints a portrait of the relationship over their whole lives as well as exploring Winston's relationship with his own father in the early chapters. I particularly enjoyed the scenes of Winston with his children, reading to them, taking an interesting in their school work, and explaining things to them. It was also interesting that the author showed to some extent how Winston’s doting on Randolph impacted his daughters and Clementine.

The book is well written and easy to become immersed in. I enjoyed the book because it took a balanced look at the Churchill men pointing out both their great gifts and their equally great flaws. If you’re a fan of Churchill and the WWII era, this is a book you’ll enjoy.

I received this book from Dutton for this review.

Winston Churchill is one of those fascinating people who you are always learning something new about, and who we will always want to read more about. Look in any bookstore and you'll probably see more books about him than anyone else. I am definitely one of the people helping to fuel this industry- always eager to read the next book on this complex man. After reading Erik Larson's wonderful The Splendid and the Vile I grew curious about his family members- especially his son, Randolph. So when Josh Ireland came out with Churchill and Son I jumped on it.

Churchill and Son describes the fascinating, emotional, and volatile relationship between Winston and Randolph. After being neglected by his own father (probably the best thing he ever did for Winston, in my opinion) Winston was determined to have a close bond with his own son. He lavished praise and affection on the boy, encouraged him to always speak his mind, and to bow down to no-one. Randolph, in return, worshipped Winston and supported his every political stance. Randolph inherited all of Winston's good qualities: intelligence, brilliant public speaking ability, and charisma. But Josh Ireland doesn't pull any punches or sugarcoat Randolph's or Winston's bad qualities. Their worst qualities are also on display- temper, frequent lack of empathy, ignoring all others to focus on themselves. Winston spoiled Randolph as a child and indulged him to the point of his being uncontrollable as a youth- and Randolph never grew out of this. Hard drinking, hard gambling, frequently cruel to friends as well as enemies and never one to forget a grudge, Randolph grew up being told he was heir to the Churchill dynasty- and believed himself entitled to be handed all that and more without having to work for it.

Ireland does a brilliant job of putting readers into the center of the Churchill family dynamics. You sympathize with the long suffering Clementine and their daughters as they are pushed to the side and Winston focuses on Randolph. You want to reach into the pages and shake Randolph for some of his worst episodes and while feeling pity for Winston for having this wretched son, you are also tempted to point out to him that spoiling the boy led to some of this behavior in the adult. The explosive fights between Winston and Randolph are as shocking to the reader as to those who witnessed them- even though after awhile you know exactly what is coming. I especially appreciated that Ireland doesn't focus only on specific time periods, like World War II, but covers their entire lives- paying special attention to Churchill's "wilderness years" between the wars, which I had not read much about before.

Meticulously researched, fascinating, brilliantly and sympathetically written without pulling any punches, Churchill and Son is the behind the scenes story of Churchill family dynamics. It's the age-old story of a man trying to make up for his own poor relationship with his father by giving his son everything. And the age-old story of a son who can never step out of the shadow of his famous father.


I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

This book was fascinating. I am a big Winston Churchill fan and I knew about the relationship between Winston Churchill and his only son, Randolph. What a unique look into their relationship, character traits, similarities, and differences. I definitely recommend this book for anyone who loves Churchill as much as I do.

Maybe I played myself thinking I would realllly enjoy this. I enjoy Larson's writings about this era but I think that more likely than anything is I personally dont get much out of a father-son centered story. I wanted MORE from those around them. Through this book I learned I don't care very much about this realm of history BUT I would not stop anyone who considers themselves a history buff or is interested in knowing some behind-the-scenes knowledge of the well known Churchill,