Author ‘destined’ to pen Civil War novel after Virginia visit

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(Free-Press-Release.com) March 5, 2008 -- Gettysburg novelist Jessica James doesn’t have any acknowledgements in front of her debut book “Shades of Gray.” But if she did, recognition would have to be given to some “one” or some “thing” in the spirit world.
“I don’t think I would have ever gotten serious about the Civil War if not for the experience I had at Chatham in Fredericksburg, Va.,” James confessed, though she doesn’t like to talk about the encounter.

Chatham, also known as the Lacy House, served as a hospital after the Battle of Fredericksburg in 1862. James stumbled across the house on a trip to Fredericksburg in the early 90s.
“Just the sequence of events that led me to the house is a little scary,” James said. “I’ve never looked at the Civil War the same since that day.”
What happened in the house was something the author has never forgotten.

“I entered a small room to the right of the main hallway, and instantly became so overwhelmed with a feeling of grief that I had to grab hold of the doorway. I can only describe it as a physical weight of intense -- really indescribable -- despair hitting me from out of the blue. I suddenly had tears running down my face and I had no idea why.”
James did not stick around, but instantly left the grounds.
“My Chatham experience probably lasted all of five minutes, but it has never left me,” she said. “I knew that experience happened for a reason.”
She began to read everything she could about the Lacy House, and became interested in the human side of the chaos of the War Between the States. Her goal was to write something that would harness those emotions and let other people feel them the way she felt them that day.

As one reviewer wrote, "The anger and fear depicted in Shades of Gray is at times almost palatable; the intense sorrow, frustration, and ultimately love, seem to transcend the pages to settle in the very marrow of the reader’s bones."
It appears she has succeeded.

author     civil war     gettysburg     Jessica James     novel     Shades of Gray     virginia