The Maid of Maiden Lane

New York, 1791: the city has shaken off its British past like a dream and wakes, vibrant and ambitious, into something new. Cornelia Moran returns from a Moravian school to find a metropolis intoxicated with its own freedom, where every street whispers of commerce, ambition, and the daring future the republic might become. Into this intoxicating world steps Lieutenant Joris Hyde, and against the backdrop of debates over the nation's capital and the shadow of the French Revolution, their love must navigate what society permits and what the heart demands. Barr writes with a lushness that recalls the Gothic romances she loved, yet grounded in the specific textures of early American life: the reconsecrated churches, the merchant mansions, the trees shading streets where Hamilton and Washington might walk. This is historical fiction as love letter to a city and a moment, concerned with the small rebellions of the heart against the large expectations of family and nation.