That Bright Land is a new Southern gothic thriller from Terry Roberts, winner of the 2012 Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction.
In the summer of 1866, Jacob Ballard, a former Union soldier and spy, is dispatched by the War Department in Washington City to infiltrate the isolated North Carolina mountain community where he was born and find a serial killer responsible for the deaths of Union veterans. Based on true events, That Bright Land is the story of a violent and fragile nation in the wake of the Civil War and a man who must exorcise his own savage demons while tracking down another.
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“With authority and authentic and precise detail, Terry Roberts brings to life an obscure corner of our history where brother fought brother and neighbor was divided from neighbor. With humor as well as compelling drama, this mystery story unfolds in conflicts of loyalty, revenge, vivid poetry of place, and the bonds of healing love. No one who reads this novel will ever forget it.”
— Robert Morgan, New York Times bestselling author
“Terry Roberts has constructed a novel of considerable historic value, containing a charming love story.”
— Elizabeth Spencer, New York Times bestselling author“That Bright Land is a thrilling and seamless fusion of fact and imagination, bringing to light a too-long neglected part of American history. This novel further confirms Terry Roberts’ place as one of Appalachia’s most important voices.”
— Ron Rash, New York Times bestselling author“[A] gripping whodunit set in the summer of 1866…This historical approaches the high standard of Owen Parry’s mysteries set during the same period.”
— Publishers Weekly (starred review)“Roberts has set his gripping detective story, That Bright Land, in the still bleeding aftermath of the Civil War. The place is backwater Appalachia and the depiction of ways and manners is not only accurate but integral to the force of the story. And what force it has!”
— Fred Chappell, author of I Am One of You ForeverBe the first to write a review about this audiobook!
Terry Roberts’ direct ancestors have lived in the mountains of Western North Carolina since the time of the Revolutionary War. Steven Roberts, during the early 1900’s, was the proprietor of the Mountain Park Hotel in the town of Hot Springs in Madison County, North Carolina. Julius and Belva Anderson Roberts lived and farmed near Hot Springs in Anderson Cove. Born in Asheville and raised in Weaverville, North Carolina, Roberts is the director of the National Paideia Center and lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina with his family. His debut novel, A Short Time to Stay Here, won the Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction.
MacLeod Andrews is a multiple Audie, Earphones, and SOVAS award-winning and Grammy-nominated narrator with hundreds of credits to his name. Perhaps best known for a cinematic approach with full characterizations and intimate deliveries in series such as The Reckoners, Sandman Slim, and Warriors, he’s also been noted for his straight reads ranging from memoirs to modern classics. When not doing books you can hear him in video games, cartoons, commercials, podcasts, and reading you the news on Apple News +. Or check out one of his films.