Varina: A Novel

"Who has given a second thought to the wife of Jefferson Davis, the first and only president of the Confederacy? Not me, I must confess. Still, Charles Frazier centers his new Civil War novel on the story of her life, taking us from her heady days at the center of the nation’s political and social circles in Washington, D.C., to her failed attempt to escape to Havana at the end of the war. A smart woman, who might have achieved a lot in different times, Varina never had much control over her own life. But looking back on it, she knows she won’t be forgiven for the part she played on the wrong side of history."