Author Jakes is famous for his American Bicentennial Series, also published as the Kent Family Chronicles, a saga of seven generations of an American family. He is also author of The North and South trilogy, and California Gold, all related by settings and conflicts to American Dreams. With the book Homeland, Jakes begins a new series about members of the Kroner family, who emigrate from Germany to America before 1900.

Josef Kroner changes his name to Joe Crown and establishes the successful Crown Brewery in Chicago. In 1890, his penniless and orphaned young nephew Paul Kroner leaves Germany and comes to Chicago, where he lives with Joseph and Ilsa and their children, Joe, Jr., Fritzi, and Carl.

Young Joe and Paul leave the Crown home because of conflicts with Joseph, Sr.,a patriarchal authoritarian. Joe, Jr. joins a radical socialist group that engages in acts of terrorism to...