When the Jessamine Grows by Donna Everhart

 

Talk of impending war is a steady drumbeat throughout North Carolina, though Joetta McBride pays it little heed. She and her husband, Ennis, have built a modest but happy life for themselves, raising two sons, fifteen-year-old Henry, and eleven-year-old Robert, on their small subsistence farm. They do not support the Confederacy’s position on slavery, but Joetta considers her family to be neutral, believing this is simply not their fight. 

Her opinion is not favored by many in their community, including Joetta’s own father-in-law, Rudean. A staunch Confederate supporter, he fills his grandsons’ heads with stories about the glory of battle and the Southern cause until one night Henry runs off to join the war. At Joetta’s frantic insistence, Ennis leaves to find their son and bring him home.

But soon weeks pass with no word from father or son and Joetta is battered by the strain of running a farm with so little help. As the country becomes further entangled in the ramifications of war, Joetta finds herself increasingly at odds with those around her – until one act of kindness brings her family to the edge of even greater disaster.

Though shunned and struggling to survive, Joetta remains committed to her principles, and to her belief that her family will survive. But the greatest tests are still to come – for a fractured nation, for Joetta, and for those she love.

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About The Author

Donna Everhart is the USA Today bestselling author of vivid, authentic Southern fiction, including the Southeastern Library Association Award-winning The Road to Bittersweet, the Indie Next Pick, Amazon Spotlight/Debut Pick, The Education of Dixie Dupree, The Forgiving Kind, and The Moonshiner’s Daughter. Her fifth novel, The Saints of Swallow Hill is out now.

Born and raised in Raleigh, North Carolina, she now lives with her husband just an hour away in the Sandhills area of the state. Please visit her online at DonnaEverhart.com.

 

My Review

 

I loved this book, it is one of those reads that you feel a loss when the last page is turned.
It is not an easy time, but the McBride family are self efficient, the year is 1861, North Carolina.
The author does such a great job with the characters in the story, and my mind was comparing the happenings in the 1930's Europe with what happens here.
Joetta is a very strong woman, she loves deeply, and really cares about others, but she is not a supporter of war. Not a popular thought at this time in the South, and we journey along with her as she experience the horrible hardships that the Civil War brings.
This is a story that made me want to offer help, I was there, but, of course, that is not possible!
I loved the author's notes, and when the last page was turned I wanted to continue on with this family!
I received this book through Net Galley and the Publisher Kensington, and was not required to give a positive review.