Trapped in the Crossfire by Gladys Hodge Sherrer was published by The Ardent Writer Press on October 1, 2017.

Trapped in the Crossfire by Gladys Hodge Sherrer, published by the Ardent Writer Press on October 1, 2017

FROM THE BACK COVER OF TRAPPED IN THE CROSSFIRE:

AMERICA HAS STRUGGLED for its identity since before the Revolution, even as a central theme of freedom has threaded its way through each generation’s vision for our country. The Civil War illuminated our inability to define freedom because it meant different things for slave or master, North or South, and rich or poor. As always, those in power determined the path for the rest, and violence tore apart America and its families. The fog of war and the malevolence of slavery had husbands, their wives and children Trapped in the Crossfire.

As author Gladys Hodge Sherrer so eloquently narrates, the endurance of family is a strength that not only tests us during peace but keeps us together during evil times. The author diligently stitches together the true story of her family, the Williams of South Carolina and then Alabama, based on her research over several years.

This is a haunting tale that reminds us of the dangers of pompous entrenchment and dark reaction to the stresses of change, as true today as it was before our nation’s greatest test. The story also shows how soldiers endured battle and hardship, even as they worried about those they left behind. It is a testament to the vigor of family and the need for pulling together, instead of pushing apart. Only then do we refuse to be Trapped in the Crossfire.

Gladys has also received some glowing endorsements of her novel from historians and forums who appreciate her focus on family in desperate times, including:

The details in Gladys Hodge Sherrer’s Trapped in the Crossfire are wonderful, the likes I’ve never seen except in diaries. Never have I’ve ever felt so close to the characters in a book, as if I lived it! — Danny K. Crownover, President & Executive Director, Etowah Historical Society & Etowah Heritage Museum, Gadsden, Alabama

Trapped in the Crossfire by Gladys Hodge Sherrer is absolutely the best narrative of life on the home front in the hill country of North Alabama that has been published in the last 10 years. — Arley McCormick, Tennessee Valley Civil War Roundtable, Huntsville, Alabama

Trapped in the Crossfire by Gladys Hodge Sherrer is a valuable book, beautifully researched, in places as detailed as a photograph. — Civil War Talk Forum Host, Colonel Annie Lane, Halifax, Pennsylvania

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

GLADYS HODGE SHERRER, an Alabama writer, sold her first published article at age thirteen to Grit magazine. She was educated at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Today, her passion is chronicling life in the Old South in her unique style, reminiscent of Eugenia Price. Completed after eight years of historical research in four states, Trapped in the Crossfire portrays the true life trials of Sherrer’s ancestors, and personifies untold numbers of others, during the Civil War years.

She writes from her beloved Appalachian foothills in Alabama. As a child, she was an avid reader of biographies and true life stories. Her writing began as a diversion, and grew to a passion by the time she became a grandmother.  Sherrer enjoys sharing the true nature of the Antebellum South’s yeomen, the majority a peace-loving, intelligent people whose lives abruptly, violently changed forever.

Steve Gierhart
Dale “Steve” Gierhart is a retired business manager for the United States Army. Based in Huntsville, Alabama on Redstone Arsenal, his career lasted from 1975 to 2010 in which he managed contracts, finances/accounting, and cost estimating for several missile defense systems, among which were Stinger, Avenger, Chaparral, Sentinel, JLENS, SLAMRAAM, and Non-Line of Sight.  The author wishes to thank the many co-workers, peers, and contractors who made these programs successful.  It is their tireless work that brought these systems to the soldier that needed them.  While budget constraints made it difficult for some of their work to see its full potential, they never blinked, they adjusted.  They persevered. Steve hails from Shawnee, Oklahoma; but most of his adult life has been spent in the beautiful hills of North Alabama where he lives with his wife, Bonny, who raises Tennessee Walking Horses. Between them, Steve and Bonny have 5 children and 9 grandchildren. Steve enjoys writing now that he is retired and plans more excursions of the imagination. He and Bonny, a retired engineer who worked as a contractor on several NASA and Army programs, will travel in their retirement though 15 horses, 4 dogs and 3 cats can crimp the best of plans.