In this series finale of historical fiction from 1864 and 1865, the spotlight shines brightest on Esther and David in the ravaged Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, while all five narrators show versions of courage, adaptation, and survival. During these closing years of the American Civil War, no human experience can be ordinary: not marriage, not enterprising work, not youthful growth. Not when folks are repeatedly disrupted by the forces of military drafts, unexpected visitors, untimely deaths, and ruptured Anabaptist churches and families. Through it all the ambiguities of freedom complicate the beliefs and actions of “the people with scruples.”
