That Dazzling Sun

By Lawrence Reid Bechtel

"That Dazzling Sun," Book 2 in The Tinsmith's Apprentice trilogy, continues the vivid coming-of-age story of Isaac Granger, slave to Thomas Jefferson, begun in Bechtel's marvelously adept debut novel, "A Partial Sun" in which Isaac begins his complicated apprenticeship at age fifteen as a tinsmith in Philadelphia in the fall of 1790. In this second book, Rachel Bringhouse, the tinsmith's daughter and Isaac's tutur, sails off to Englad to work alongside the famous social activist and poet, Hannah Moore, writing enthusiastic letters to Isaac and which Isaac answers back with assistance from the irrepressibly poetic cook's helper, Ovid. Meanwhile, Billey gardner, the feisty and opportunistic former slave of James Madison, pesters Isaac with notions of a business partnership; the charismatic Dr. Cornelius Sharp uses Isaac to confront Jefferson as a debt-ridden slaveowner; and the Reverend Richard Allen provides Isaac with a most surprising document. When an exuberant Rachel returns from England with a key insight and Isaac's hated nemesis Daniel Shady reappears, bent on revenge, the book rises to its crescendo, in which Isaac must rise to his own power and bargain at last with Thomas Jefferson on his own terms.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BQB Publishing
• Release date: Aug 1, 2020
• ISBN: 9781945448423

Lawrence Reid Bechtel

Sculptor and author Lawrence Bechtel began his journey toward the writing of "A Slave in Philadelphia," his debut novel, with two bronze portrait sculptures: the first of Thomas Jefferson and the second of Isaac Granger, who had grown up as a slave at Monticello. During the course of this work, and the extensive research it involved, Lawrence read about Isaac's brief account of his time in Philadelphia as a tinsmith's apprentice and felt compelled, finally, to write a historical novel built from that account. This began with a long process of finding Isaac's voice, encouraged as he did so by the words of E.M. Forster from Howards End: "only connect." A former English teacher at Virginia Tech, book reviewer for The Roanoke Times, and creator of three CDs' worth of short stories, Lawrence is presently working on the sequel novel for this series.