Follow the Wind Home: A Novel

On a wintry day in 1860, Catherine Corlis and Mary Todd Lincoln cross paths in a Springfield, Illinois cemetery while visiting their babies' graves. Catherine, shunned by the townspeople after a brothel owner stole her innocence, and Mary, whose husband is running for president, bond over their deep-rooted grief. When Mary invites Catherine to visit her, Catherine must find the strength to break the chains of grief that hold her captive to the past. As the Civil War descends on the nation, she inherits her uncle's sheep farm one mile from a Union recruiting camp, and she runs head-on into formidable foes: the brothel owner from her past, savage prairie storms, smallpox, and death. It is only through the help of childhood friend Fred Winterford, former nun Sister Ann Carrigan, and a drifter named Dandy that she is able to face all the challenges that threaten to defeat her.Follow the Wind Home is the story of a woman whose fierce love for her family and her Sangamon County home hinder her from moving forward. It is the story of shepherds and lambs and the sprawling prairie on which they live. It is a home front story of the Civil War.Most of all, it is an epic story of love and loss, and of how to find the faith to embrace change and time.The novel is written in the literary fiction style of Willa Cather and John Steinbeck. It is a regional, prairie novel that plumbs the topic of grief and the challenges of overcoming it.