Cover Reveal: All Different Kinds of Free and the Story of Margaret Morgan

Some stories survive in the historical record only in fragments: a court case, a legal opinion, a date, a name. The larger human truth—the fear, the love, the endurance, the cost—can disappear beneath the language of law.

That is one reason historical fiction matters.

Today, we’re honored to share the cover of All Different Kinds of Free by Jessica McCann, a powerful historical novel that restores a human voice to one of the most consequential stories in nineteenth-century America. Centered on Margaret Morgan—a free woman of color who was kidnapped and sold into slavery—the novel brings readers into a life and a struggle that history has too often reduced to a footnote.

With this fully revised 15th Anniversary Edition, McCann’s award-winning debut is poised to reach a new generation of readers. And we’re especially pleased to make it available to the History Through Fiction audience through our Early Access Program before its wider release.

A woman at the center of history

The historical case connected to Margaret Morgan is often remembered as Prigg v. Pennsylvania, a Supreme Court decision that became a major pro-slavery ruling and helped intensify the states’ rights conflicts that would eventually erupt into the Civil War. That constitutional history matters.

But All Different Kinds of Free asks readers to look more closely—and more humanely—at the woman whose life stood at the center of that conflict.

Margaret Morgan was not an abstract legal principle. She was a mother, a wife, and a free woman whose home and family were shattered when bounty hunters entered her life with violence and force. In McCann’s retelling, the emotional truth of Margaret’s experience is brought into focus: the terror of abduction, the fierce instinct to protect one’s children, and the refusal to surrender hope even when the machinery of law and power seems determined to erase it.

That shift in emphasis is one of the great strengths of historical fiction. It reminds us that the past was lived by individuals—not by case names.

Why this novel matters now

Historical fiction does more than revisit the past. At its best, it helps us re-encounter history through conscience, empathy, and imagination.

All Different Kinds of Free does exactly that. Richly researched and emotionally resonant, the novel illuminates a critical but too-often overlooked chapter of American history. It also speaks to enduring questions that continue to matter: Who is protected by the law? Whose freedom is treated as negotiable? And what happens when ordinary lives are caught in the violence of political systems larger than themselves?

These are difficult questions, but they are part of why stories like Margaret Morgan’s must be told—and retold.

Jessica McCann’s novel gives readers both a gripping narrative and an invitation to remember. It restores visibility to a woman whose courage helped expose the brutal realities underlying debates about slavery, property, power, and personhood in the United States.

About Jessica McCann

Jessica McCann brings to this work the instincts of both a seasoned writer and a deeply engaged storyteller. Over more than three decades, she has written for magazines, universities, corporations, and other organizations, with work appearing in publications such as Business Week, The Writer, Phoenix, Raising Arizona Kids, and ASU Research.

Her fiction has earned notable recognition as well. All Different Kinds of Free, her debut historical novel, received the Freedom in Fiction Prize. Her later novel Peculiar Savage Beauty was named 2018 Arizona Book of the Year, and Bitter Thaw was named 2023 Best Indie Book by Shelf Unbound and received a 2024 Foreword INDIES Gold Award for Historical Fiction.

That record is evident in the confidence and care of her storytelling. McCann writes with a strong sense of narrative momentum, but she also understands the moral responsibility involved in telling stories drawn from painful histories.

Early praise for All Different Kinds of Free

The novel has already drawn powerful praise from respected voices in the literary world.

Jewell Parker Rhodes called it “a gripping story” that “illuminates a forgotten history of a free woman and her children abducted into slavery who fought for freedom, dignity, and social justice.”

Erika Robuck described it as “a moving, heart-rending account of injustice,” praising McCann’s ability to balance history and story through “a courageous, honorable, and remarkable woman.”

Kathleen Grissom wrote that McCann “brings to light a story that defies imagination, rich with detail and historical significance,” and thanked her for telling a story that “needs to be told.”

That combination of historical weight and narrative force is exactly what many readers seek from the genre.

Pre-order now through History Through Fiction

We’re delighted to offer All Different Kinds of Free to our audience ahead of its broader release.

While the novel will be officially released on Tue Nov 10, 2026, the History Through Fiction audience will be able to access it through our Early Access Program on Thu Sep 10, 2026—two full months before it is available anywhere else.

If this is the kind of historical fiction you care about—deeply researched, emotionally compelling, and centered on lives history has too often overlooked—we invite you to reserve your copy now.

Pre-order here: All Different Kinds of Free on the History Through Fiction store

You can also learn more about the novel here: All Different Kinds of Free landing page

And to explore more of Jessica McCann’s work, visit her website: jessicamccann.com

Closing reflection

One of the gifts of historical fiction is that it can return us to the lives hidden behind the record. It can take what has been flattened by summary and restore complexity, suffering, bravery, and meaning.

That is part of what All Different Kinds of Free offers. It is not simply a novel about a Supreme Court case. It is a novel about a woman, a family, and a fight for freedom that deserves to be remembered.

We’re proud to share this cover with you, and even more proud to help bring this remarkable story to new readers.

Pre-order the novel here: All Different Kinds of Free on the History Through Fiction store