Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier

I have had a keen interest in regional literature since the summer of 1963 when I worked for the Council of the Southern Mountains, and I have been a bookseller specializing in books about Appalachian for just shy of 40 years now. No regional book, in that time, has soared to the levels of popular and critical success as quickly and securely as Cold Mountain! It remained at the top of the New York Times best seller list for 61 weeks! It sold three million copies. It won numerous literary awards, including the National Book Award! The novel is told in two compelling voices. Inman is a Confederate soldier who decides to desert after being wounded at Petersburg and walk back to his home near Cold Mountain in Haywood County, North Carolina, to the woman he loves and hopes will make a home with him. On the way he deals with an amazing array of both dangerous and hilarious characters. Ada is struggling mightily to survive the war's civilian deprivations on a small farm threatened by both arm