Books > The Confederate General Rides North

Growing up in Georgia in the 1960s, eleven-year-old Katherine McConnell, a precocious Civil War buff, is so fascinated by stories of the war's generals that she often imagines herself one of them: riding her pony, leading troops to battle. When Kat's mother wakes her early one morning for an impromptu road trip north to find antiques for a shop she wants to open, Kat seizes the opportunity for real adventure. It will be just her, her mother, and their Chevy Impala.

As the navigator, Kat cleverly charts a course that takes them to battlefields and historic sites, following the path of her heroes. She hopes the trip also will provide her beautiful, impulsive mother the means for success. But as they travel farther from home, Kat discovers that each stop brings not only new experiences but new questions. Unexpected revelations test her faith in her mother, her understanding of the war, and her confidence in the trip's outcome; neither her mother's intentions nor the glory and adventure depicted in her history books are quite what they had seemed. When their journey comes to an abrupt halt in Gettysburg and Kat faces the threat of real tragedy, she must make an irrevocable choice about where their ultimate destination -- and her loyalty -- lies.

An utterly original, richly imagined novel about mothers and daughters, the stories we revere, the legacies we inherit, and the ache of growing up too soon, The Confederate General Rides North introduces an enormously talented new voice in Southern fiction and a captivating, unforgettable young heroine.