This week I finished "The Whiskey Rebels" by David Liss and I wonder if I'm overhyping it to say that I'm not sure I've enjoyed a book more in the last five years.

"The Whiskey Rebels" is a historical novel, set in the 1790s, that has authenticity and the ring of long hours of research, but it's a rip roaring yarn as well. When I tell you that it concerns intrigue swirling around Alexander Hamilton's fiscal policies and the establishment of the Bank of the United States, you may be tempted to remember dozing off in Civics class. Don't.

The novel features two narrative lines in an offset chronologies, a structure that is one of the novels many pleasures. Joan Maycott ventures to the wilds of Western Pennsylvania, suffers hardship but rises to revenge, while disgraced spy Ethan Saunders tries to sober up long enough to understand the forces arrayed against him.

Saunders is the sort of scoundrel that, were he alive today, might be an employee at a fatherhood website. His formal speech made me think of Alastair Cook's narration of the Stanley Kubrick classic "Barry Lyndon." I busted out laughing at him at several, rather embarrassing, moments, as I listened to this book on my iPod while running around Lady Bird Lake.

There are reversals, familiar historical figures, beautiful ladies, encrypted messages, scalawags, gentlemen and blazing pistols galore. I loved this book so much I started "cheating" and listening to it even when I wasn't running.

Highly, highly recommended.