The political tumult in the American Colonies immediately following the French and Indian War was as turbulent as the war itself. With the war’s conclusion and English liberties now presumably guaranteed, the British government felt secure enough in its North American hegemony to reap the spoils. In rapid succession, Privy Council orders, royal proclamations, and acts of Parliament were put forth culminating in the Stamp Act of 1765, all designed to loot the Colonies of their wealth and work. Just as colonist Jack Frake and Peer Hugh Kenrick had warned their fellow Virginia planters would happen. Fighting for moral clarity in an age of great change and much risk, Jack and Hugh follow different but equally passionate paths toward a future free from tyranny and injustice. Sparrowhawk Book Four: Empire dramatizes the conflicts between the colonials themselves and with the mother country, and reveals the contest of wills between reason and greed, pride and hubris, on the road to the American Revolution. About the author: Edward Cline is the author of two other novels: First Prize, a detective novel, and Whisper the Guns, a suspense novel, and has written for a variety of publications including the Colonial Williamsburg Journal and the Marine Corps League. His essay on John Locke was anthologized in McGraw-Hill’s Western Civilization. He lives in Yorktown, Virginia