Wilma Dykeman tells the story of a tight-knit mountain family living in Appalachia as the Civil War ends and Reconstruction begins.  Lydia McQueen moves to a mountain clearing when her husband, Mark, returns from fighting for the Union during the Civil War and has a difficult time readjusting to their predominately Confederate town in the valley.  On the mountain they raise six children, just a few hours away from Lydia’s parents and siblings who live in the valley below.  The family survives the hardships of mountain life and other trials during a time of political and economic difficulty. Lydia is a woman of action who works hard to rebuild her community and leave the next generation with something better – a school.

The Tall Woman features well-developed characters and relationships without neglecting the character of the Appalachian environment.  Lydia is no less tied to her family than she is the land she farms and the livestock she raises.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

Posted: August 5th, 2009 under 1960-1969, 1962, Dykeman, Wilma, Graham, Historical, Mountains.
Comments: none

Child of the South continues the story started in The Road from Chapel Hill. The War has ended, but Eugenia, Tom, and Clyde all face substantial hardships. Eugenia travels to Wilmington, where she lives with family and searches for the truth about her past and her mother. She also meets and becomes friends with Abraham Galloway, the former Union spy who is a charismatic leader and one of the new African American state Senators in Raleigh. Back in Chapel Hill, Clyde–who was crippled fighting for the Union–struggles to keep his farm afloat and his family alive. Ironically, the former fugitive-slave hunter is helped in this endeavor by Tom, the ex-slave who was given his freedom by Eugenia and at one point captured by Clyde.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library Catalog.

Posted: June 1st, 2009 under 2000-, 2009, Coast, Historical, New Hanover, Novels in Series, Orange, Piedmont, Scott, Joanna Catherine.
Comments: none

• A Perilous Proposal. Minneapolis, MN: Bethany House Publishers, 2005.
• The Soldier’s Lady. Minneapolis, MN: Bethany House, 2006.
• Never Too Late. Minneapolis, MN: Bethany House, 2007.
• Miss Katie’s Rosewood. Minneapolis, MN: Bethany House, 2007.

In the Carolina Cousins books, the follow-up series to the Shenandoah Sisters books, cousins and best friends Katie and Mayme are still together, but the early years of Reconstruction are hard for the girls. They face both the normal difficulties of growing up and the many troubles of their time. Throughout the series, the girls face adversity–often related to race–and new characters who arrive at Rosewood become part of the family. The themes of friendship, forgiveness, determination, and faith run throughout the books.

Posted: February 9th, 2009 under Historical, Mystery, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Novels in Series, Phillips, Michael, Religious/Inspirational, Romance/Relationship, Series.
Comments: 2

The Soldier’s Lady is the second book in the Carolina Cousins series and, although it continues the stories of Katie and Mayme, it is focused upon Micah Duff. Micah had a hard childhood in Chicago, but grew up to become an educated, thoughtful, and spiritual man. After the end of the Civil War, the former Buffalo soldier finds his way to Rosewood Plantation where he reconnects with old friends, becomes a new and important part of the Rosewood family, and helps them face a threat from a cruel man from Emma’s past.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

Posted: January 28th, 2009 under 2000-, 2006, Historical, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Novels in Series, Phillips, Michael, Religious/Inspirational, Romance/Relationship.
Comments: none

A Perilous Proposal follows the life of young Jake Patterson, a slave who flees for the north after fighting off his mother’s white attacker. After a stay with some Union army soldiers, he eventually finds his long-lost father in North Carolina and meets Katie and Mayme, the two young women who live at Rosewood plantation. Jake soon falls in love and wants to start a new life, but he is held back by anger and resentment from his past. In this, the first book in the Carolina Cousins series, the residents of Rosewood also face physical threats from intolerant men in the nearby (fictional) town of Greens Crossing.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

Posted: January 20th, 2009 under 2000-, 2005, Historical, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Novels in Series, Phillips, Michael, Religious/Inspirational, Romance/Relationship.
Comments: 1

Zach Whetsone, a lad from Rutherford County, happens to be selling his produce in Spartanburg, South Carolina one spring day when the commencement exercises at Wofford College are taking place. Zach is inspired by the event and later returns to Wofford as a student. As a poor mountaineer, Zach has to overcome many obstacles to complete his degree. When he finally does, he returns home to marry his true love, preach, teach, and start a high school. Zach is presented as an admirable figure: working hard, caring for his widowed mom, staying true to his love, and speaking out for national reconciliation, but his racial attitudes (or, those of  the author) will offend many readers.

Check this title’s availability and access an online copy through the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

Posted: November 14th, 2008 under 1900-1909, 1903, Clinkscales, J. G., Mountains, Novels to Read Online, Rutherford.
Comments: 6

Ivy: Lilies of the Field is Larry Morgan’s third novel based on the lives of Ivy Rowland, his great-grandfather’s first wife, and her friends and family. While the previous two books–Ivy:Yankee Sweetheart, Rebel Nurse and Ivy: Camp Branch to Groveton–take place during the Civil War, this one is bookended by military conflicts: it starts in the final days of the Civil War and ends with the Spanish-American War. In the three decades between the wars, marriages are celebrated, houses are built, and children are raised. Some of the characters settle near the Nantahala Gorge in western North Carolina, while others make their lives in Georgia or Virginia.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

Posted: November 14th, 2008 under 2000-, 2006, Historical, Macon, Morgan, Larry G., Mountains, Novels in Series, Swain.
Comments: none

In Miss Katie’s Rosewood, the fourth and final book in the Carolina Cousins series, it is 1870 and the main characters Katie and Mayme are now young women. At the urging of the older generation of the Daniels family, the cousins and best friends agree to travel to Philadelphia to visit a women’s college and explore the possibilities of higher education. They also hope to visit with their respective beaus, who have both traveled to Pennsylvania. On the train ride north, however, the cars are segregated by race, the girls are separated, and Mayme is kidnapped. Meanwhile, back in fictional Shenandoah County, Rosewood is threatened by the Ku Klux Klan. The girls weather their troubles with the help of family, friends, and their Christian faith.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

Posted: November 5th, 2008 under 2000-, 2007, Historical, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Novels in Series, Phillips, Michael, Religious/Inspirational, Romance/Relationship.
Comments: none

The third book in the Carolina Cousins series, Never Too Late follows the story of Josepha (Seffie). A slave in her childhood years, Seffie weathers significant personal hardship, beginning when she is sold away from her family as a punishment at seven years old. She plans her escape from slavery for years and eventually tries–and fails–to get to the North through the underground railroad. The story continues into the post-Civil War years, explaining how she comes to live and work at Rosewood, the home of the Carolina Cousins (and Shenandoah Sisters) series’ overall main characters Katie and Mayme. Like other books in the series, the main themes of Never Too Late are the characters’ faith, friendship, and dependence upon each other.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

Posted: November 4th, 2008 under 2000-, 2007, Historical, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Novels in Series, Phillips, Michael, Religious/Inspirational, Romance/Relationship.
Comments: none

Although this novel is set in the mountains of western North Carolina, plantation slavery is presented is part of the local heritage and figures in the plot. The shoe is on the other foot when John Marshall returns to his hometown near Asheville in the 1870s. Northerners have come to this part of the South and they are making their presence felt through land purchases and business deals. His family home has been sold and is now a boarding house run by the optimistic and energetic Portia Van Ostade. Old racial and social attitudes are still alive, but the younger characters find romance across the sectional divide. The happiness of one young couple is threatened by a secret from the past.

Check this title’s availability and access an online copy through the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

Posted: October 23rd, 2008 under 1900-1909, 1901, Buncombe, Erskine, Payne, Mountains, Novels to Read Online.
Comments: none