In curiously parallel lives, Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr were both orphaned at an early age. Both were amazing students who went to college–one at Princeton, the various other at Columbia–and researched law. Both were young staff officials under General George Washington, and both became war heroes. Politics beckoned them, and each offered in the recently formed government of the fledgling country. Why, then, did these two face one another at dawn in a duel that finished with death for one and opprobrium for the additional?Judith St. George’s exciting biography, told in alternating chapters, brings alive two complex men who played major roles in the formation of america.