After the Crossing

"As their ship heaved and plunged in the rolling seas, George felt like they were riding a great stallion and he, gripping the rail, was holding the reins of this great beast as it plowed headlong into his future..."
After the Crossing is a historical novel set in 17th century New England. The story begins nine years after the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock, and follows the life of eleven year old George Ingersoll and his Puritan family as they sail into Salem Massachusetts to establish themselves in the New World, join other like-minded religious worshippers, and acquire the land needed to forge a lasting legacy.
Hard work and relocation to the New England frontier prove rewarding for the Ingersoll's. Then, after mounting Indian resentments, war breaks out. The region is thrust into a bitter Anglo-Indian conflict that terrorizes both sides, and George is caught in the middle.
George navigates through these tumultuous times with a growing family to protect. The Ingersoll's and their in-laws, the Wakely's, struggle over spiritual differences and both suffer tragic losses. Pushed out of Falmouth (early Portland Maine) for a second time, George retreats to Salem for the last chapter of his life, only to be confronted by the cruelty and hypocrisies of the Salem Witch Trials, a pointless persecution of innocent people fueled by the hysterical fears of Puritan society, including members of George's own family.

It is a story of youthful idealism, the Great Migration, the subjugation of First Nations peoples, romance, violent conflict, settler hardships, culture clash, religious zeal, refugee struggles, community building, and collective insanity, all disturbingly relevant to present day social issues, both in America and around the world.