Choices, a novel in progress, is a story about William Featherstone and the choices he makes. When he was twelve years old, he joined the English Army in Montreal as drummer boy for the 41st Regiment of Foot Soldiers, the regiment in which his father was serving. Subsequently, his father is killed and young William is captured by the Americans during the war of 1812.
William was given an opportunity when the war ended. He could return to his mother and siblings in Montreal, or he could start a new life in America. He chose the latter, and his story begins. We follow him through Tennessee, interacting with the building of the state, in his association with the people of that time. He arrives in Texas just as The Republic of Texas is born. It is a fictional historical journey through real time.
The novel is written in the first person, for William is transcribing it into his journal as a old man. After his death, after the journal is completed, the story will continue from the third person point of view. William’s fictional story is one of adventure, a tale of innocence and guilt, conflict and compromise, passion and pain. Of hope and disillusionment. Of revenge and justice. It is a story about bloodlines, the power greed and envy have in the destruction of innocent families. And it is about how forceful the intervention of Fate is in the affairs of one man’s life. How it shapes events and consequences in the lives of his offspring and those who wish them harm generation through generation.
And beneath it all is the land: both the protector of William’s heirs and protected by them. Dogwood Haven is the family homestead and memorialized estate, where the Texas descendants of William Featherstone through his Caddo wife, Dee, originate. William and Dee build a village they named Silverton, along with four other founding pioneer families in the new Republic of Texas. The village thrives, as the lives of the people interconnect, both in love, and in hate.
It is a dramatic historical saga. My hope is to tell the tale of the hopes and dreams of one man as he made a life for himself and those he loved, always searching for a better future in a time when life was hard, when times were trying, when families depended on each other, and the land. It is about his mistakes, as well as his wisdom. And as it is in all our lives, hindsight for William Featherstone is 20/20.
I am posting this in Chapters. If you would like to read along as I am writing it, go to Categories, to Choices: Chapters . I would love your input.
Anita Stubbs 