One shot fired deep in the pine forests of her youth was all it took to change Hattie's life forever. At the age of fourteen, Hattie learns that her mother, Addie, is dead, and her father, Hubbard, stands accused of Addie's murder, along with countless other shocking betrayals. Overnight, Hattie becomes mother to her three siblings while still very much a child herself.
The life she had dreamt of now seems impossible to achieve. How will Hattie break away from the father who prevents her from living the life she desperately wants? Will her heart ever be able to heal in the height of The Great Depression?
From the Author
My Granny, the real Hattie Andress Riley, inspired this story. In 1993, she told me the story of her parents, her mother's death, and her father's troubled life. Granny passed away in 1996, leaving a hole in my life that will never be filled. In 2011, after struggling for years to find my own something special separate from my husband's very successful Army career, I decided to do something with the story Granny told me. She was an avid reader, so a novel featuring a fourteen-year-old version of her seemed a fitting tribute. Through writing The Woods at Barlow Bend , I discovered so much about Granny. I learned she was much more than the old woman in socks and sandals who spoiled me rotten. She was a tough broad with an unbreakable moral fiber. I learned why she made the choices she made in her life. Mostly, I learned that "something special of my own" could be as simple as a loving husband and children and strength of character. I learned just how beautiful she really was.
About the Author
Jodie Cain Smith spent her childhood exploring the shores of Mobile Bay with her three siblings. As a teen in Mobile, AL, Jodie's grandmother told her the gripping story of an adolescence spent in 1930's rural Alabama, the rumors surrounding her parents, and the murder trial that would alter her life. The tale took root in Jodie's memory until at last it became The Woods at Barlow Bend, her debut novel to be released November 19, 2014 by Deer Hawk Publications.
While attending the University of South Alabama, where Jodie earned a BFA in Theatre Arts, she met her husband Jay. They began their life on the Army road in 2001 and have not stopped moving since. As an Army Wife, she has lived in six different states from the extreme heat of Texas to the blizzards of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, where she earned a MAE in School Counseling at Northern Michigan University.
When she is not living in the fictional worlds she creates via her laptop, Jodie can be found onstage and in the studio working as an actress and teaching artist.
Jodie Cain Smith's short stories, feature articles, and columns have appeared in The Petigru Review, Chicken Soup for the Military Spouse's Soul, The Savannah Morning News, and the Fort Hood Sentinel.