Pleasant Hill: A Novel

Pleasant Hill

a novel

DRISKILL HORTON

I

n early 1864, after 30 months of bitter fighting back east, Major David Hawkins returns to his small cotton farm near Shreveport to find

the fresh grave of his loving young wife, Emily. Still grieving, Hawkins discovers a blood-stained Rebel cap in his saddle bags, recalling a promise he made to the man who died saving his life at the Battle of Shiloh.

Hawkins then rides south to the little village of Pleasant Hill, giving 13-year-old Johnny McRay his father’s cap. He also meets Amy Bolton, the local teacher who helps heal him of his own losses.

At that same time, the Red River Campaign has begun, a huge Union expedition to occupy Northwestern Louisiana. As the war comes to his very homeland, Hawkins reluctantly trades back his plowshare for the sword. Pleasant Hill is a hauntingly poignant tale of love, loss and adventure. A Confederate officer struggling to keep his faith and honor, and find purpose in a lost cause, while a troubled adolescent seeks retribution on his path to destiny.

Dris Horton’s first novel, Pleasant Hill, offers a glimpse at a unique, little-known theater of the American Civil War. Born in California and raised in Louisiana, Dris now lives in Atlanta.

He is currently working on his second novel, Sam’s War, largely based on his late grandfather’s survival experience as a B-17 pilot shot down into Nazi occupied Yugoslavia. Dris has also written several short stories and screenplays.