A Separate Country is set post Civil War in New Orleans, Louisiana. General John Bell Hood was one of the more controversial figures of the Civil War, and after the war he became one of it's most tragic. Loosing a leg and the use of an arm during the war, he retreated to New Orleans after surrender, where he married Anna Marie Hennon and fathered 11 children. As good and decent a man as he was, he constantly struggled to overcome his misfortunes and admit to his failures. Haunted by war memories and hunted by financial ruin due to poor choices, his loved ones were the only ones who could eventually rescue him and show him how to love and how to be loved. If only his sense of love and freedom from the ghosts had had longer to reighn in his life. Shortly after shaking off the chains of failure, he succumbed to yellow fever, along with his wife, and two children.
I selected this book for several reasons, but primarily because I enjoy Civil War history, and because I loved Robert Hicks previous novel, The Widow of the South.
While A Separate Country was well written and an interesting story, I had trouble staying in it and it was not the novel that The Widow of the South was for me! I much prefer that one to this most recent one. Overall, I was not thrilled with this book, and probably won't read it again or encourage others to read it. However, I am eager to learn more about Gen. John Hood and how much of the story was real and how much was fictionalized. And so now that I've finished the novel, and written my blog review, I'm off to do some internet research about the real man and see what I can learn.
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