The Tamarack Tree — Patricia Clapp

Orphaned at thirteen, Rosemary Leigh was transplanted from England to Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1859. Four years later, to distract her from her fear as cannonballs batter the besieged city, Rosemary writes about what she has been through.

While she has been growing up, enjoying the social pleasures of a Southern young lady, the tensions between North and South have developed into civil war. Because she is English, Rosemary brings an outsider's perspective to the issues that sparked the conflict, but nonetheless she is torn between her sense of outrage at the very idea of slavery and her feelings for the Southerners she has come to love. For Rosemary, her brother Derek, and their American friends -- old and young, white and black -- the disastrous siege of Vicksburg comes as a crucial test of courage and the will to survive.

Once again, Patricia Clapp has created a heroine of wit, charm, and indomitable spirit in a vividly evoked historical setting.