By: L. M. Elliott
Paperback Edition
Children's - Grade 4-6, Age 9-11
March 2008


The American Revolution is about to ignite!

Life is tough for thirteen-year-old Nathaniel Dunn, an indentured servant in colonial Virginia. Yet in a twist of luck, he meets Basil, a kind schoolmaster, and an arrangement is struck lending Nathaniel's labor to a Williamsburg carriage maker. Basil introduces Nathaniel to music, books, and philosophies that open his mind to new attitudes about equality. The year is 1775, and as colonists voice their rage over England's taxation, Patrick Henry's words "give me liberty, or give me death" become the sounding call for action. Should Nathaniel and Basil join the fight? What is the meaning of "liberty" in a country reliant on indentured servants and slaves? Nathaniel must face the puzzling choices a dawning nation lays before him.


About the Author:
L. M. Elliott is the author of several award-winning novels for older readers, including the historical novel under a war-torn sky, a Notable Children's Trade Book in the Field of Social Studies (NCSS/CBC); Flying South, winner of the Joan G. Sugarman Children's Book Award; and Annie, Between the States, a New York Public Library Book for the Teen Age and an IRA/CBC Teachers' Choice. She is also the author of the picture books Hunter's Best Friend at School and Hunter and Stripe and the Soccer Showdown, illustrated by Lynn Munsinger. She lives with her husband and their two children in Virginia.