The Hazard Trade

In British-occupied Newport, Rhode Island, the most dangerous weapons are the people the enemy refuses to see.

Newport, Rhode Island is the crown jewel of the colonies—one of the most beautiful cities, one of the wealthiest, with the finest natural harbor in the new world. Rhode Island is a hotbed of rebellion, and the British have made an example of it: brutally occupying the city, blockading the harbor, and cutting off trade. More than half the population has fled the island, every tree has been cut down to feed the voracious need for firewood, and the British have begun tearing down the houses of those who left for fuel.

William and Mary Hazard have spent their marriage choosing principle over profit: refusing the slave trade, sheltering the vulnerable, building something decent in a city being consumed by British occupation. When soldiers raid their provisions shop and arrest them in front of their children, their careful neutrality is shattered. Survival now demands something far more dangerous than principle.

The Hazard family fights back the only way they can: in the shadows. Mary becomes the architect of a covert intelligence network hidden in plain sight, drawing on the networks women have always maintained—the gossip of officers' wives, the quiet solidarity of those the powerful ignore. William navigates a deadly game of mutual blackmail with British command. Their daughter Bridget, who has been secretly documenting British patrol patterns for two years, finally has someone to give the intelligence to. And their son Benjamin is drawn into a dangerous double game when he catches the eye of a brilliant British counterintelligence officer.

Their allies are as unlikely as they are formidable. Duchess Quamino, an enslaved caterer, risks being torn from her children to spy on British officers from inside their own dining rooms. Her intelligence is a lifeline for her husband, John, a free Black man braving the brutal Atlantic to earn the money to buy his family's liberty. He sails as first officer to Harry Sherman, a dangerous, grieving privateer captain waging a relentless war of vengeance against the empire that murdered his wife.

As a massive French fleet approaches and a catastrophic hurricane threatens to destroy everything, the Hazards and their allies must navigate the razor's edge of espionage.

The Hazard Trade is a story of ordinary people doing extraordinary things in the shadows of history—and of what it truly costs to resist.

Book one in an ongoing series, The Hazard Trade is a historical thriller set in Colonial Newport, Rhode Island. Think Turn: Washington's Spies meets The Alice Network.

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