Review: "My Dear Hamilton" by Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie
I have just finished the new historical novel by Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie about Eliza Schuyler Hamilton, the wife of Alexander Hamilton, entitled My Dear Hamilton. Wow, what a story! There have been numerous books written about Alexander Hamilton but in this novel, Eliza is the star. The authors have taken all the information that they could find about Eliza and woven it together to bring her to life. Using various sources, from her letters to Alex, friends and family members, to documented accounts of her activities, they brought to life a woman who is strong and lived a long and storied life with many accomplishments of her own.
The story is told in Eliza’s voice and this allows the authors’ to fully develop her character. From the very first page in the prologue to the very last of the book, you are brought face to face with Eliza and her many joys and sorrows. Not only do you read about them, but because of the excellent writing, you also feel the emotions that would have accompanied them. Her triumphant is yours as are the depths of her sorrows as life deals her more than her share of miseries.
Ms. Dray and Ms. Kamoie have previously shown their immense talent in America’s First Daughter for bringing to life women in history who had previously been overlooked. They have once again struck gold with their telling of Eliza’s story and I highly recommend it.
I have selected an excerpt to share, which I particularly like because it speaks to when they were falling in love, and in particular what Eliza recognized in Hamilton's heart that spoke to hers...
“You haven’t any family?”I asked.
His fingers wrapped around mine, tentatively, then tighter and tighter as if he feared I would pull away when he went on to explain that in the West Indies he had a brother, and an estranged half-brother, but that his father abandoned the family and that his mother died when he was only twelve.
My heart pounded in an agony of sympathy for him, wondering how he’d made his way, a veritable orphan, left to fend for himself. I couldn’t fathom it. In no circumstance, either prosperity or wreck, would my own long-suffering father leave us to the vagaries of fate. And I realized anew how fortunate I was.
“You must pardon me, Miss Schuyler. I do not speak of these things often. And in such specificity, never. It dredges up . . .”He didn’t finish but seemed to sense my welling pity. “I do not mean to paint a picture of me as a barefooted street urchin. Before my mother died, we had books, a silver tea set, and a covered bed.”How miserable an inventory he felt compelled to make. “What you must think . . .”
“I think that I wish to know you better.”
He smiled softly. “A saintly answer from a saintly girl.”
For no reason I could understand, I was desperate to disabuse him of this notion. And between what I’d seen outside that camp and all that Hamilton had just revealed, I felt nearly overwhelmed with an urgent mix of emotion. Sadness, helplessness, pity, attraction, and desire. Obeying an impulse I could scarcely comprehend, I leaned forward to kiss him.
He actually startled, his hands grasping at wrists as if he meant to push me away. As if he was the sort of man who never allowed an intimacy that he didn’t initiate. But then his grip on my wrists tightened and held me fast. It was as if my boldness had thrown a spark that Hamilton ignited into an all-consuming fire, for his mouth claimed mine and demanded to be claimed in return. It was no tender kiss we shared, happy and sweet.
It was a kiss that tasted of grief and desperation. But also, unmistakably and forcefully, ardor. I forgot the cold. I forgot the soot and darkness of the cabin. I forgot the rank smell of the camp. Everything vanished except for that kiss and the stark terror of realizing that I was falling in love.
