by David Nasaw
First published 1987
Thomas Jefferson sits in his study at Monticello, wrestling with the contradictions that will define a nation. Nasaw follows multiple generations of Americans as they navigate the promises and failures of democracy. Sarah, a mill worker in 1840s Massachusetts, fights for labor rights while her son joins the westward expansion. Their descendants face Civil War battlefields, immigrant neighborhoods, and Depression-era breadlines. Each character confronts the gap between American ideals and lived reality. The novel traces how ordinary people shape extraordinary moments, from colonial rebellion through the atomic age. Nasaw weaves together stories of farmers and factory workers, enslaved people and immigrants, showing how individual choices create collective destiny. The book reveals how Americans have always struggled to fulfill the revolutionary promise of equality while building a nation on compromise and conflict.
Genres: american-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, american, 21st-century, american-history
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Massachusetts, Monticello, United States
Period: 1840s, Civil War, Depression Era
Paperback · Dorsey Press