Bøger af Lawrence Reid Bechtel

In this second book, Rachel Bringhouse, the tinsmith's daughter and Isaac's tutor, sails off to England to work alongside the famous social activist and poet, Hannah Moore. Rachel writes enthusiastic letters to Isaac, which Isaac answers back with assistance from the irrepressibly poetic cook's helper, Ovid. Meanwhile, Billey Gardner, the feisty and opportunistic former slave of James Madison, pesters Isaac with notions of a business partnership; the charismatic Dr. Cornelius Sharp uses Isaac to confront Jefferson as a debt-ridden slave owner; and the Reverend Richard Allen provides Isaac with a most surprising document. When an exuberant Rachel returns from England with a key insight and Isaac's hated nemesis Daniel Shady reappears, bent on revenge, the book rises to its crescendo, in which Isaac must rise to his own power and bargain at last with Thomas Jefferson on his own terms.

In 1852, after much searching through the Black districts of Petersburg, Virginia, the amateur historian Charles Campbell finally located Isaac Granger, a formerly enslaved man who worked for the late Thomas Jefferson. Though disinterested at first in sharing his memories, Isaac was at last persuaded to tell the full story of his time in Philadelphia as a young man in the early 1790s. It was supposed to have been a simple story: he would apprentice with a Quaker tinsmith and then return to Monticello to produce tinware for sale in such abundance that Jefferson might pay down his plantation's crippling debts. But Isaac was impressionable and more thoughtful than Jefferson knew. Philadelphia was a big city, home to a thriving African-American community, and Isaac met all manner of characters: Billey Gardner, a formerly enslaved man who worked for James Madison; the dangerous and charismatic Dr. Cornelius Sharp; the Reverent Rich Allen; the hateful Daniel Shady, who could not abide that Isaac should learn tinsmithing at his side as an equal; the tinsmith's daughter, Rachel, who taught Isaac to read. Isaac got himself into difficulties, contemplated his place in the world, and was challenged to do more than just serve. Conflict was inevitable.