The Fourth of July: Fireworks, hot dogs, potato salad, parades,  washing the dog (hey, not everyone has the same rituals).  These are just a few of the things that most people will be partaking of this Saturday. If you're like me (but not so much so that you'll be giving your dog a bath), you'll use the long weekend to catch up on some reading.  And what better thing to read than a novel about the birth of our nation. Here are a few titles that may help put you in the Spirit of '76:

Rise to Rebellion by Jeff Shaara focuses on the 1770 killing of civilians by British troops and the ensuing trial where John Adams defended the soldiers. Other historical figures figuring prominently in the narrative are Benjamin Franklin, General Thomas Gage, Abigail Adams, and George Washington.

Drums Along the Mohawk by Walter D. Edmonds is almost forgotten  today, but when it was published in 1936, it was a best seller for two years (second only to that juggernaut Gone With The Wind) and was made into a film by John Ford in 1939 that starred Henry Fonda and Claudette Colbert. The book focuses on newlyweds Gilbert and Lana Martin who settle in the Mohawk Valley in 1776 only to get swept up in the drama of the Revolutionary War as they and their neighbors must choose which side to be on.

Whiskey Rebels by David Liss is a"private eye" novel set in the 1780s. The protagonist, Ethan Saunders, is a former spy for George Washington who is hired by Alexander Hamilton to find his ex-fiancee's missing husband. The plot becomes even more complicated when Saunders encounters Joan Maycott who, along with her husband, run a whiskey still in rural Pennsylvania.

Howard Fast's April Morning centers on the Battle of Lexington and its role in fifteen-year-old Adam Cooper's initiation into manhood. The novel was not written as a young adult novel but it has come to be placed on high school reading lists.  A film version was made in 1987 starring Chad Lowe and Tommy Lee Jones.