Regular print version previously published by: Kensington Publishing Corp.

Includes discussion questions.

"In her sweeping debut, Diane C. McPhail offers a powerful, profoundly emotional novel that explores a little-known aspect of Civil War history--Southern Abolitionists--and the timeless struggle to do right even amidst bitter conflict"--,Provided by publisher.

Mississippi, 1859. Judge Matthews is an abolitionist who runs an illegal school for his slaves, hoping to eventually set them free. One, a woman named Ginny, has become his daughter's companion. When Emily Matthews begs her father to save a slave, Nathan, about to be auctioned away from his family, it sets off a tangled, tragic string of events when the family arrives at the Matthews farm. A young doctor, Charles Slate, tends to injured Nathan and begins to court Emily, finally persuading her to become his wife. But their union is disrupted by a fatal clash and a lie that will tear two families apart. -- adapted from back cover