Eleanor Kuhns

It's the 1790s, and the circus has arrived in Durham, Maine. Before weaver Will Rees is able to take in its spectacle, he spots Magistrate Hanson - the man he blames for his family's having to flee Dugard two years earlier....

Fresh from facing allegations of witchcraft and murder, travelling weaver Will Rees, his heavily pregnant wife Lydia, and six adopted children take refuge in Zion, a Shaker community in rural Maine. Shortly after their arrival, screams in the night reveal a drowned body....

September 1800, Maine. Will Rees is beseeched by Tobias, an old friend abducted by slave catchers years before, to travel south to Virginia to help transport his pregnant wife, Ruth, back north. Will's wife, Lydia, convinces him to go - on the condition she accompanies them....

Will Rees is back home on his farm with his teenage son, his pregnant wife, their five adopted children, and endless farmwork under the blistering sun. But for all that, Rees is happy....

January, 1801. When Lydia’s estranged father is accused of murder, Will Rees escorts her to Boston to uncover the truth. Marcus Farrell is believed to have murdered one of his workers, a boy from Jamaica where he owns a plantation. Marcus swears he’s innocent....

November 1800, Maine. After helping their longtime friend Tobias escort his wife, along with a liberated slave and her child, from the Great Dismal back to Durham, Will and Lydia Rees’ lives are interrupted when a dead body is found near their home....