| Novel # | 11 |
| Title: | Independence |
| Author: | John Peel |
| Printed: | August 1996 Berkley/Boulevard |
| ISBN #: | 978-1572971509 |
| Leap Date: | August 11, 1776 |
| Cover: | Stephen
Gardner |
| Pages: |
246 |
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Smithtown, Long Island, New York
Leaping into the body of one of his own ancestors, Sam Beckett finds himself at the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, where his actions depend upon whether the Beckett from the past was a Tory, patriot, or double spy.
Summary & review by Dermot Devlin of the former quantumleaping.com:
For the first time in Quantum Leap, Sam Beckett has leaped outside his own lifeline. For all Quantum Leap nitpickers, this episode takes place before The Leap Between the States.
Sam has leaped into the body of his great-great-however-many-times grandfather, who is also called Samuel. The time period that Sam has leaped into is not his own as I stated previously, but is August 1776, The War of Independence. There is some confusion as to where Samuel's loyalties lie. Ziggy cannot figure out if Samuel was a Patriot or Tory and with Sam's Swiss Cheesed memory, he cannot remember the family history. If Samuel was a Tory, then he was spying on the Patriots on behalf of the Tories. Several clues point to that, but nothing concrete.
Al arrives to tell Sam that he is here to save the life of Isaiah, a fellow member of the Committee of Safety, which go around terrorising British sympathisors out of the area. Apparently the rest of the Committee turn on Isaiah and murder him. Sam is also told to try and not affect the live of Samuel and his family, as it would have serious precussions in his own life.
I found this book to be one of the best Quantum Leap novels that I have read. I was completed hooked on the book from start to finish. John Peel's certainly appears to be a fan of Quantum Leap as he got Sam and Al's characters down to a tee. There was not one moment in the book that I got bored reading. Everything was moving at a fast enough for me to be excited about what was going to happen next, without getting confused as to what just happened.
There was just one tiny little part of the book that I did not like. At the end when Al goes back to Project Quantum Leap for the conclusion of the book, he and Donna Eleese-Beckett have a conversation. I will not go into what the conversation was about, as I do not want to spoil the book for people who have not read it. But this conversation did not need to take place. The book was strong enough on its own without this little conclusion, and quite frankly it took away from what was otherwise a grade A novel.
There was just one tiny little part of the book that I did not like. At the end when Al goes back to Project Quantum Leap for the conclusion of the book, he and Donna Eleese-Beckett have a conversation. I will not go into what the conversation was about as I do not want to spoil the book for people who have not read it. But this conversation did not need to take place. The book was strong enough on its own without this little conclusion, and quite frankly it took away from what was otherwises a grade A novel.
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Prepare for a revolutionary Leap, because it’s time for Independence!
Join hosts Allison Pregler, Matt Dale and Christopher DeFilippis for another meeting of the QLP Book Club, as we dive into John Peel’s historical thriller that sees Sam Leap back along his own timeline into the Revolutionary War.
We’re also proud to bring you an encore presentation of our interview with author John Peel. He speaks to QLP Co-Executive Producer Hayden McQueenie about the circuitous route to publishing Independence — and a few other wild QL novel ideas he had along the way.
And yeah, we talk about the grandma thing. A LOT.
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Leapers will know John Peel best as the author of the Quantum Leap novel “Independence”, and Peel has been more than happy to discuss his time writing “Independence” and his many other published works. So now please sit back and enjoy Hayden’s conversation with John Peel.
John Peel was born in Nottingham, England (the home of Robin Hood) in 1954. He was a rather sickly child, so instead of playing games and sports, he read a lot. And reading a lot led Peel to want to create his own stories, so then he began to write a lot. Peel was 27 before he became a professional by selling his first story – a comic strip to Marvel Comics. He then managed to sell articles about British television shows to an American magazine, Fantasy Empire.
Peel moved to New York in 1981 to get married, and shortly after that, became the editor of Fantasy Empire. Peel’s first book came as a result of that, and then he started to write fiction. His first original novel was Uptime, Downtime – about two orphans who discover they have the ability to travel through time, but accidentally erase their own timeline in the process and have to attempt to change history back to the way it was meant to be, in 1992, and Peel has been writing novels ever since. Peel’s original works include:
The Diadem series: a game-like series of novels in which the main characters must travel to and complete challenges on different planets;
The Dragonhome series: a sister and brother each have Talents, which are considered dangerous in their world. They are on the run from the Kings Men, who want them in their army, and must seek sanctuary at Dragonhome, in which they discover strange noises in the night and a deadly secret hidden in the castle;
The Magical States of America: What if there was another world that existed alongside our own that was almost the same as ours, but twisted in a different direction? A world where they used magic to live their everyday lives instead of science, as we do? A world where there’s another you, but of the opposite sex? This book series imagines just that…
2099: Cloning, computer hackers, and a secret society dedicated to taking over the world…
Shockers: a series of horror stories, each with a completely unpredictable ending…
Foul Play: Childrens games gone wrong… and deadly…
In addition to his extensive original works, Peel has also written numerous television, movie, and video-game tie-in stories, including Dr. Who, The Outer Limits, Star Trek, James Bond Jr, The Avengers, and Are You Afraid of the Dark? The Secret World of Alex Mac, Eerie Indiana, Carmen Sandiego, and Star Wars. While most authors get their start selling short stories, Peel admits to never having been able to do things quite the same way as others, so it was some time after his novels that Peel managed to sell his first short stories. Among his short stories are “The Tales of the Shadowmen”, a series that takes characters from French literature and stories set in France, and gives them new life. To this day Peel has still sold more novels than short stories!
Currently, John Peel lives on Long Island with his wife and menagerie of dogs. The Peels have been active in helping to rescue abandoned and unwanted Miniature Pinschers for several years and as a result ended up keeping the ones they couldn’t find homes for.