This story touches—briefly—on the history of racism and slavery in the North, a history that is sometimes surprising to Americans who learned of slavery as a thing that existed south of the Mason-Dixon line. For those who are wondering, yes, there were enslaved people in Rhode Island at the start of the Revolutionary War, and yes, Rhode Island, after not having enough soldiers enlist, decided to open their rolls to black men—and on February 14, 1778, the Rhode Island Assembly voted that “every slave so enlisting shall, upon his passing muster before Colonel Christopher Greene, be immediately discharged from the service of his master or mistress, and be absolutely free.”

This law stood in place for four months before slave owners insisted on its removal, but by that time, many enslaved men had already took steps to secure their freedom. The Rhode Island First Regiment—which was later collapsed with the Second into just the Rhode Island Regiment—came to be known as the Black Regiment because of the large number of African American soldiers who fought in it.

As for what happened afterward to John’s family in Newport, this was also an incredibly common practice. In theory, “warning out” was a practice in the New England states which was used to coerce outsiders into leaving before they could become a drain on the town’s resources—usually because the town deemed them unable to care for themselves. In practice, communities warned out those whom they deemed undesirable for many reasons. African-Americans were disproportionately warned out as compared to their peers.

For those interested in learning more, I highly recommend Christy Mikel Clark-Pujara's dissertation, "Slavery, emancipation and Black freedom in Rhode Island, 1652-1842," which you can find at:

And for those wondering how likely it was for a community of African Americans to find an island in Maine and settle there…the answer is, very likely! So likely that it’s already happened. At one point, Malaga Island in Maine was settled by a mixed-race community. The inhabitants were incredibly poor, and as often happened to poor, mixed-race communities, they were eventually forced to leave. But the inevitable consequence of kicking out everyone that doesn’t look like you is that those people go and find their own place.

And if you want to know what happens next to our intrepid band, well… there’s always next book.

* * *

I had the idea for this novella early in 2016—what we might call a younger, more hopeful, more innocent time. At that point, my thought for what would happen in this book was something along the lines of:

1. Meet at Battle of Yorktown! Fight! Abscond!

2. …?

3. …?!

4. …!!

5. HAPPY ENDING

I had some ideas, but had other projects that needed my attention first, and so I set this to the side.

I turned back to it in December of 2016. Now, it turns out that December of 2016 was a very different time than March of 2016, mostly because sometime between March of 2016 and December of 2016, November 8th happened. And…then, November 8th kept happening.

Those of you who know a little bit about my personal history know that from 2006 to 2008, I served as a law clerk—first to Alex Kozinski on the Ninth Circuit and then to Justices Sandra Day O’Connor and Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court. I care about this country—its legal history, its founding documents. I care about the evolution of this country in small and dorky details, like the incorporation of the Bill of Rights against the states, or the modern Commerce Clause jurisprudence, or . Most importantly, I care about the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution, amendments that came many decades after the founding of this nation, and which finally began to deliver on the most fundamental promises that were made in the Declaration of Independence—that all men people were created equal, and should be treated equally under the law.

It has been hard to watch the ideals (if not history) of this country come under attack—birthright citizenship, equality under the law without regard to race or religion.

This history is very personal to me. When my great-great-grandfather first came to this country, he did not bring his wife for a variety of reasons. One of them was that it was difficult for Chinese women to immigrate under the law. For two generations, my forebears lived in this country, returning to China only for brief visits to marry, visit spouses who would not come with them, and say hello to children whom they might never see again. My mother’s mother is my first maternal ancestor to bear her children on US soil.

When my parents married, their marriage—between a Chinese woman and a white man—was illegal in seven states.

If I had happened to fall in love with a woman instead of a man, up until two years ago, I would not have been able to marry.

Progress has been good to me and mine. Regression, knowing where we have come from, is a little frightening. I found it hard on a very personal level to write a story about the founding of this nation when it felt as if I might be witnessing its end.

But there is a kind of comfort to be had in the awfulness of history—a comfort that times have been dark before and better ideals have prevailed. American ideals have always been locked in a struggle with the darkest moments of her history, but those ideals have won, and won, and won again.

It took eighty years after its ratification for the Constitution to reflect equality, and eighty years beyond that for the country to begin to acknowledge the changing Constitution. As this third set of eighty years comes to a close, I am more determined than ever to hold on to those ideals.

They have, after all, survived all this time.