Random House Publishing Group, 2008. Hardcover. Good. Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less.Dust jacket quality is not guaranteed.

Synopsis

David Liss's bestselling historical thrillers, including A Conspiracy of Paper and The Coffee Trader, have been called remarkable and rousing: the perfect combination of scrupulous research and breathless excitement. Now Liss delivers his best novel yet in an entirely new setting--America in the years after the Revolution, an unstable nation where desperate schemers vie for wealth, power, and a chance to shape a country's destiny.Ethan Saunders, once among General Washington's most valued spies, now lives in disgrace, haunting the taverns of Philadelphia. An accusation of treason has long since cost him his reputation and his beloved fiancee, Cynthia Pearson, but at his most desperate moment he is recruited for an unlikely task--finding Cynthia's missing husband. To help her, Saunders must serve his old enemy, Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, who is engaged in a bitter power struggle with political rival Thomas Jefferson over the fragile young nation's first real financial institution: the Bank of the United States.Meanwhile, Joan Maycott is a young woman married to another Revolutionary War veteran. With the new states unable to support their ex-soldiers, the Maycotts make a desperate gamble: trade the chance of future payment for the hope of a better life on the western Pennsylvania frontier. There, amid hardship and deprivation, they find unlikely friendship and a chance for prosperity with a new method of distilling whiskey. But on an isolated frontier, whiskey is more than a drink; it is currency and power, and the Maycotts' success attracts the brutal attention of men in Hamilton's orbit, men who threaten to destroy all Joan holds dear.As their causes intertwine, Joan and Saunders--both patriots in their own way--find themselves on opposing sides of a daring scheme that will forever change their lives and their new country. The Whiskey Rebels is a superb rendering of a perilous age and a nation nearly torn apart--and David Liss's most powerful novel yet.From the Hardcover edition.

Reviews

On Oct 27 2008, Feeney said:

David Liss's 2008 historical novel THE WHISKEY REBELS weaves together three events in the early American Republic. These are the chartering of the first Bank of the United States in 1791, the financial panic of 1792 and the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794. Widowed Joan Maycott, who wishes to write the first great American novel, believes that by persuading Congress to impose an excise tax on the making of whiskey, Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton is responsible for the violent death near Pittsburgh of her whiskey distilling husband, Andrew. Step by step the handsome, brilliant Joan wins allies and builds a network of whiskey boys to do her bidding with an eye to toppling Hamilton and making themselves rich. ***

The second major fictional player in THE WHISKEY REBELS is Ethan Saunders, a onetime star in George Washington's Revolutionary War spy network. Ten years earlier, just before Yorktown, Saunders was asked by Colonel Alexander Hamilton to resign from the Continental army under suspicion of selling minor secrets to the British (a charge eventually proven false). From initial hater of Hamilton, Saunders slowly comes to admire and defend him. This puts him on a collision course with the conspirators around Mrs Maycott, though it is years before they discover each other and she tries to make him a pawn in her schemes to ruin Hamilton. ***

I will not spill many more words on a book far too long and tedious. The historical underpinnings are too undramatic and technical (6% bonds, 4% bonds, the usual greed and fear of stock markets, political jockeying by Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson, etc., etc.) to justify the ungainly, rambling narrative structure. As a morality tale THE WHISKEY REBELS is not without attraction. Its thesis is that civilization is a very thin veneer. Transport well read, Christian men and women to a frontier wilderness (in this case the environs of Pittsburgh) and they will become nasty, unkempt, murderous and self-absorbed. David Liss provides some good local color in the lovingly recreated taverns of late 18th Century Philadelphia and New York. Otherwise, forget this book. -OOO-

(Log in or Create an Account first!)

Details

Bookseller: ThriftBooks (US)
Bookseller's Inventory #: G1400064201I3N00
Title: The Whiskey Rebels
Author: David Liss
Format/Binding: Hardcover
Book Condition: Used - Good
Quantity Available: 1
ISBN 10: 1400064201
ISBN 13: 9781400064205
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Place of Publication: New York
Date Published: 2008

Terms of Sale

ThriftBooks

30 day return guarantee, with full refund including original shipping costs for up to 30 days after delivery if an item arrives misdescribed or damaged.

About the Seller

ThriftBooks

This seller has earned a 4 of 5 Stars rating from Biblio customers.

Biblio member since 2018

Seattle, Washington

Ask Seller a Question

About ThriftBooks

From the largest selection of used titles, we put quality, affordable books into the hands of readers

Glossary

Glossary

Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:

Jacket: Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
Spine: The outer portion of a book which covers the actual binding. The spine usually faces outward when a book is placed on a shelf....