Litchfield, Connecticut, 1822-1823. This historical fiction picks up where The Apprenticeship of Ebenezer Wells left off. Eb Wells returns to Litchfield to the law office of Theodore Fuller, Esquire. His fellow apprentice is Charles Godwin, Eb’s best friend from law school. Disappointed siblings petition to defeat the will of their brother, who has left his farm to his common-law wife, a free Black woman. Eb also resumes his fraught courtship with Rebecca Harding.  

Things go awry. Theodore Fuller falls ill. Samuel Taylor, from Haines & Haines in New Haven, is recruited to try the case with Eb. But Samuel falls for Elizabeth Stafford, Rebecca’s childhood friend, and is injured in a fistfight with her former suitor. Eb and Charles try the case in the Litchfield County Courthouse. Vigilantes disagree with the verdict—with violent results. In the background, the Lewis family undergoes some painful transitions, as Charles and Martha prepare to marry and move to Ohio.

Eb and Rebecca are failing as a couple. Rebecca seeks employment at a female academy. Eb becomes obsessed with the trial. A tempting job offer falls into Eb’s lap, one that will take him around the world. Will ambition trump love? Can this couple survive?  

The Trial of Ebenezer Wells can be read as a standalone, but it is the third book in a tetralogy, The Litchfield Chronicles. For the prequels, read Book 1, The Education of Ebenezer Wells and Book 2, The Apprenticeship of Ebenezer Wells. Book 4, The Education of Johanna Wells, leaps forward to 1838, completing the series. Eb and Rebecca will meet again.