Frazier is a superb prose stylist who elevates the historical fiction genre…his writing can be breathtaking

A splendid historical novel just right for our time

Riveting…this is a sharp evocative novel

Frazier works on an epic scale, but his genius is in the details – he has a scholar’s command of the physical realities of early America and a novelist’s gift for bringing them to life

Frazier is a writer whose spare prose paradoxically oozes atmosphere – you can almost smell the verdant pine trees and hear the crack of the twigs underfoot . . . Beneath the chilling, photogenic story, the writing remains beautiful.

Superb…Frazier’s historical research generally sits lightly on the story, almost always embedded gracefully in dialogue, a small telling incident or a sharp memory of kindness or brutality. His prose is both of the characters’ time and perfectly evocative… A finely wrought novel that will reward re-reading. Elegiac without being exculpatory, it is an indictment of complicity without ignoring the historic complexity of the great evil at the core of American history.

Clear-sighted depiction of culpable leaders in a divided America.

‘[A] fine historical novel … A strong human story and, in the capable hands of Frazier, the author of Cold Mountain, is both emotionally engaging and rich in historical insights.

Moving

Frazier’s elegant prose and vivid, dreamy conjuring of V’s youth and her attempted exodus has an air of romance about it … Fascinating.

Here’s a woman of the Civil War to outshine Scarlett O’Hara

A visceral, powerfully written evocation both of the beaten South at the nadir and of one of its more unusual survivors.

The narrative is sweeping and Frazier has a beautiful style of writing.

Frazier’s writing is, as ever, spectacular in place.

Elegant, elegiac prose

Riveting…this is a sharp, evocative novel