Gap Creek

They claim that young Julie Harmon works "hard as a man," sometimes to the point that she questions her ability to quit. She is relied upon by the populace to butcher the pigs and tend to the sick. There is a lot to accomplish, and many are weak. She marries at the age of seventeen and relocates to the Gap Creek valley, hoping for a better life.

However, Julie and Hank's new existence in the valley during the latter years of the 1800s is more nuanced than they could have ever dreamed. It might be difficult to know whether natural disasters—fires and floods or human swindlers, intoxicated people, and nosy neighbors—should dread more in their new existence. They have to discover if love can ward off chaos and craziness in order to live. Gap Creek is a classic marital narrative because of the couple's challenges with the environment, their jobs, the changing century, and the setbacks and victories they experienced together.

Robert Morgan is a native of the mountains of North Carolina, having grown up on property his Welsh ancestors had established. He is a distinguished writer and poet who has been recognized with awards such as the Jacaranda Review Fiction Prize, the North Carolina Award in Literature, and the James B. Hanes Poetry Prize. His book The Truest Pleasure was a nominee for the Southern Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, and his short stories have appeared in Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards and New Stories from the South.