A Statue for Jacob

'This debt was not contracted as the price of bread or wine or arms. It was the price of liberty.' -Alexander Hamilton Kiah Harmon, a young Virginia lawyer, is just emerging from the most traumatic time of her life when actress Sam van Eyck walks into her office, unannounced, with the case of a lifetime. She asks Kiah to recover a 200-year-old debt from the US Government - a debt that goes right back to the time of Alexander Hamilton. The selfless generosity of Sam's ancestor, Jacob van Eyck, in making a massive loan of gold and supplies at Valley Forge, during the freezing winter of 1777-1778, may well have saved George Washington's army, and the War of Independence, from disaster. But it reduced Jacob to ruin. Despite the government's promises, the debt was never repaid, and this hero of the American Revolution died in poverty, unknown and unrecognised. Two hundred years later, Sam and Kiah embark on a quest to change that. But first, they will have to find the evidence, and overcome a stubborn Government determined to frustrate their every move. Will Sam and Kiah succeed in finally getting Jacob the statue he deserves?

About the Author :
Peter Murphy graduated from Cambridge University and spent a career in the law, as an advocate, teacher, and judge. He has worked both in England and the United States, and served for several years as counsel at the Yugoslavian War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague. He has written nine other novels: two political thrillers about the US presidency, Removal and Test of Resolve; seven historical/legal thrillers featuring Ben Schroeder, A Higher Duty, A Matter for the Jury, And Is There Honey Still for Tea?, The Heirs of Owain Glyndwr, Calling Down the Storm, One Law for the Rest of Us and Verbal. He is also the author of three Judge Walden of Bermondsey collections of short stories. He lives in Cambridgeshire.

Review :
Praise for Peter Murphy; 'Murphy's clever legal thriller revels in the chicanery of the English law courts of the period' - Independent; 'And Is There Honey Still For Tea? is an intelligent amalgam of spy story and legal drama' - Times; 'No one writes with more wit, warmth and insight about the law and its practitioners than Peter Murphy' - David Ambrose, playwright and novelist; 'It is to the author's credit that this fiction sometimes reads and feels like a dramatic re-telling of a real event' - Crime Review; 'Murphy paints a trenchant picture of establishment cover-up, and cannily subverts the cliches of the legal genre in his all-too-topical narrative' - Financial Times