THE STORY OF CAPE COD IS THE STORY OF AMERICA Land of the Mayflower, cradle of America's ideals, and forge of her hopes for the future, Cape Cod has always mirrored the story of America. Now, in this new, multigenera-tional novel, the New York Times bestselling author of the historical epic Back Bay cap-tures both the mystique and magnificence of this sandy curl of coastline-and creates an ambitious, absorbing book about America's past and present. Focusing on two founding families, the Bigelows and Hilyards, their extraordinary first decades in America, and the devastating problems facing their present-day descendants, CAPE COD stands with the best of James Michener's works in bringing to life the violence and the passion behind a nation's dreams. Martin vividly re-creates the families' har-rowing journey aboard the Mayflower and, through the captain's log, tells of a mysterious drowning that may just be the first murder in America, an incident that will divide the Bigelows and Hilyards for hundreds of years. The author shows the families settling on New England's shores, their uneasy truce with the Indians, their participation in the founding of a new nation...and how, genera-tion after generation, the Bigelows and Hilyards march to the beat of American history, through wars, depressions, and great upheavals. In exploring the inextricable links between past and present, he introduces us to the unforgettable descendants of these two proud families, people now embroiled in con-troversy that reaches back to the days of their ancestors. The secret source of their feud can be traced to a single document: the Mayflower log. Its existence and whereabouts soon become an obsession for Geoff Hilyard, the heir to his family's last stretch of pristine Cape Cod shoreline.

ISBN: 9780446515108