A Marked Man

Near the outset of Hamilton’s well-crafted second Abigail Adams mystery (after 2009’s The Ninth Daughter), 16-year-old Lucy Fluckner comes to Abigail for help. A good friend of Lucy’s, 24-year-old bookseller Harry Knox, who prints pamphlets for the Sons of Liberty, has been arrested for the murder of Sir Joseph Cottrell, the King’s Special Commissioner and, according to Lucy’s Tory chaperone, Mrs. Sandhayes, Lucy’s fiancé. Lucy insists that the victim, a notorious womanizer, was not her fiancé, her heart all too clearly belonging to the accused. Abigail and her lawyer husband, John, resolve to prove Harry innocent. The disappearance of a Negro servant woman from the house of Lucy’s Loyalist parents adds to the intrigue. Hamilton once again brings to life colonial Boston on the brink of revolution, vividly portraying such noted patriots as Sam Adams, leader of the Sons of Liberty; silversmith Paul Revere; and Dr. Joseph Warren. The action builds to a bizarre if satisfying ending. (Oct.)