High Hearts

On April 12, 1861, Geneva Chatfield marries Nash Hart in Albermale County, Virginia. Five days later, Virginia secedes from the Union and Nash joins the hastily organized Confederate Army. Geneva is too tall to be pretty, but at eighteen she is attractive and bright as a cigar band. She is also the best rider since Light Horse Harry Lee and as headstrong as Andrew Jackson. So when For Sumter’s guns fire the signal for every able-bodied Southern man to enlist, Geneva stares fate dead in the eye.

Geneva cuts her hair, don’s a uniform, changes her name to Jimmy, then enlists in the confederate cavalry to be with her beloved. This works out fine, until Nash, with his poet’s sensitivities, recoils from the horrors of the war, while Geneva is invigorated by the chase and the fight. If Nash isn’t going to be a man, she’ll show him how. But there are complications.