Rayford’s Garden

It is 1864.

Sherman’s troops are

rampaging across Georgia.

Rayford’s Garden is in their path.

On a small farm in northwest Georgia, twelve-year-old Tatum Wiley runs wild under her father’s doting eye, devising clever plans that generally go awry and land her in trouble. But as the war comes closer her father enlists and asks Tatum to care for his brother, Rayford, a mentally handicapped artistic savant who spends his days carving realistic likenesses in their garden.

Tatum’s promise is given lightly until Rayford disappears and she realizes it is up to her alone to care for him. Yet when Yankee soldiers attack, it is one of Rayford’s carvings that changes the course of their lives, sends Tatum on a daring adventure and makes her question if what she’s been fighting hardest is the thing she wants most.