Author Susan K. Salzer discusses her debut novel, a fictional story set in Missouri during the Civil War that is based on actual events.

Hattie Rood is a teenage girl whose weary family is given an extra burden when Confederate rebels leave a wounded 17-year-old Jesse James in her care.

While her aging father tends to their struggling tobacco crop, Hattie nurses the boy back to health—learning about herself and the nature of war along the way.

Salzer expanded her 2009 Spur Award-winning short story into Up from Thunder.

The book will be available for sale.