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A family drama unfolds in the Tidewater Region of colonial Maryland!
Martin McDonnell enjoys an idyllic existence growing up on a tobacco plantation in the early 1750's. His grandfather, Thomas, oversees a large number of enslaved Africans and brings prosperity to the owner, Colonel Cornelius Edgeworth, a prominent Catholic planter. Young Martin works hard on the plantation, attends private school, and engages in daily adventures with Ishmael, the slave boy he calls his 'brother'. Crabbing, oystering, fishing, and trapping are just some of the many pastimes they enjoy. As Martin's formal education progresses, he perceives the widening gulf that threatens to separate them. This gulf expands further when Martin is sent to the Jesuit school at White Marsh plantation.
Martin and Ishmael are allowed to visit with native Americans living on the fringes of Edgeworth's vast landholdings. The two discover a whole other world, living for several weeks with remnants of the Eastern Woodland tribe known as the Piscataway. Martin learns how to shoot a bow and arrow, track game, make snares, and set fish traps. Living off the land, he gains valuable insight into a vanishing way of life. Martin returns to White Marsh to further his education. The Jesuits believe in a well-rounded individual, and, in addition to rigorous classroom instruction, they teach Martin to plow and harrow, ride horses, clear land, plant gardens, and perform other farm chores. They even send him to a private finishing school to learn the manners of the colonial upper class.
Forces beyond Martin's control threaten to undo an entire way of life. Harold Marston Fitch, a disinherited lord and disgraced soldier, arrives from Ireland on a mission of revenge. A master manipulator, Harold latches on to personalities he knows he can control—namely, Duncan, son of the ailing Colonel Edgeworth. Harold's antics bring a plantation to near ruin, and he tries to engineer the takeover of Duncan's estate. The legal—and illegal—maneuvers soon embroil the McDonnells as their beloved slaves suffer under the cruel depravity of new owners. Martin's anti-slavery views are forged on the banks of the Severn River as slaves are sold at the market in Annapolis.
Consumed by wrath, Harold launches his long-standing plan of revenge. His plot to kill Thomas McDonnell, over a decade in the making, threatens to involve Martin. The family flees to Maryland's western frontier, where violence and cruelty clash with honesty and goodness. This gripping drama plays out on Maryland's eastern shore, in the many inlets and coves of the Chesapeake, and in the rugged mountains on the frontier.
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