December 2024 . . . After the death of his Marine Corps father in Iraq and his struggles to support his alcoholic mother, a disillusioned Max Engelhardt has abandoned all thoughts of his family’s long tradition of military service, despite his grandfather’s urging to attend the U. S. Naval Academy. Instead, Max keeps his emotional armor up while immersing himself in the study of history, helping care for the family farm, and volunteering at the historical Trent House near the New Jersey shore along the Delaware River in Trenton.
Through a quirk of fate, he unintentionally finds himself thrust back into the yesterday of 1776 a few weeks before the pivotal Battle of Trenton. Suddenly everything he believes is challenged. He meets a Hessian officer, Adam, who is now acting as a spy for Washington. Because of a family resemblance, Adam assumes Max is his long-lost brother and sends an indentured servant and colonist-sympathizer, Ellie, to help persuade Max to join the colonists’ cause. Now everything, including his belief that war resolves nothing, comes into question for Max. In Ellie he has found a love that has been missing in his life, and he realizes there are causes that demand military efforts. But will he take up arms and fight for the creation of a new country?
Welcome to the Revolution.
Click here for book club discussion guide.