Occasionally, life and art bump up against each other in a way that makes me stop and think. In my case, I was spending all my available time on July 3 and 4 finishing a book so I could write a review about it. The book was The Tory Widow by Christine Blevins. I have met Christine on two occasions, agreeing to review her book for the Historical Novels Review before I realized that I should probably have recused myself (not remembering the name of the woman I'd enjoyed speaking with at the previous HNS conference), but was too far along to back out. I'm professional. I can be impartial.

Fortunately, the book was good. But that's not what got me thinking. It was more the subject: a widow in New York of 1775-1776, having to make her way through the dangerous shifts of power in a small but important city. Blevins' heroine maintains her independence despite everything, which made me happy. But Blevins' extensive research and ear and eye for authentic period details really brought me back to that time. It was a long, bloody struggle. And we, I thought, celebrate independence day as if it all happened overnight, as if the piece of paper (important, don't get me wrong) that codified it all was what it took for the United States to be born.

The timing was fortuitous. I thank Christine for doing such a huge amount of research and using her talent to bring it to life on the page. Especially in New York, where so much of the early history is buried under buildings and infrastructure, it's easy to forget the city's strategic role in the conflict that gave birth to our nation. Having not spent too much time on U.S. history since high school, I've now got a renewed interest in it.