When Martha Wayles Skelton meets Thomas Jefferson, he is a rising lawyer and legislator and she is a twenty-two-year-old widow who is determined not to marry again. She is beautiful, educated, and playful - with a mind and a spirit to match his own - and she becomes the one great love of his life, his confidante and his closest friend. They are married in 1772 as the pulse of rebellion begins to quicken, and for ten years as the revolution rages they struggle together to build Monticello and to raise their family. Thomas resigns from politics in 1781, believing he has done his share; but when Martha dies the following year, he returns to public service in misery. Forty years later, he still sadly calls her "the cherished companion of my life."