Monticello's Dark Secret (Paperback)

The moment Martha Jefferson discovers the few drops of negro blood coursing through her veins, she knows she will do anything -- anything to keep her terrible secret from her politically ambitious husband Thomas. In this meticulously researched novel that successfully melds historical fact with an intriguing "what if, " we are led back in time to the gripping tale of two women, Martha Jefferson and Betty Hemings, both forgottenthreads in the rich tapestry of America's history. Nothing about these fascinating women save their names and a few brief footnotes has survived the centuries -- not a likeness, not a personal letter -- nothing. We do know both women belonged to Thomas Jefferson, one through the vows of marriage and the other through the laws of slavery and both lived, dreamed and died in l8th century Virginia in the company of an extraordinary man at a time in our new Nation when fact was far more exciting than fiction. And now we are finally able to know and understand them as they might have been.