The opening salvos of the American Revolution come to life via this historical novel that follows the impact of the war on one Boston family caught in the maelstrom.

It is March 1775, and 21-year-old Josiah Hartford, the eldest of six siblings and a handsome, eligible Boston gentleman, is tired of engaging in the city’s most popular topic of conversation—will there be a war? His younger brother, Walter, a member of Paul Revere’s Sons of Liberty, tells him the day will come when Josiah will be forced to choose between the king and the American patriots. Josiah scoffs at him. A recent Harvard graduate, he had hoped to continue his studies of the great Western philosophers for a postgraduate degree. Unfortunately, his father, Benjamin, is ill with a weak heart. Josiah has been summoned home to run Hartford Ships, the company his father built more than 30 years ago, now one of New England’s premium shipbuilders. British ships have been arriving in Boston Harbor bearing King George III’s military. Among them is British Lt. Hugo Chamberlain, Josiah’s dearest friend. Josiah has not seen him for four years, ever since Hugo’s father sent him to join the king’s army. But when the two men reunite at Castle Island, a Redcoat stronghold, Josiah realizes that Hugo, now an ardent advocate for the British Empire, has changed. This is the first crack in their friendship, and it signals the beginning of a series of tragic events that transform Josiah, the philosophical pacifist, into a fighting member of the rebel army. Through his eyes, readers witness the brutal battles of Lexington and Concord and later Bunker Hill (ironically fought on the neighboring Breed’s Hill). Miller’s narrative alternates between page-turning action and sections filled with personal and family drama—with a dose of melodrama. Josiah’s increasing complexity is in stark contrast to Hugo’s diminishment into an unsettling, flattened caricature, plagued by unrequited love, jealousy, and the need for revenge. But the author’s meticulous attention to atmospheric cultural details and descriptions of period weaponry add up to a narrative win. Readers will hope for a sequel.

A vivid and entertaining war tale.