From bestselling author Emerson Ford comes an unforgettable true story of a spirited woman caught between freedom and duty, set against the sweeping backdrop of the American Revolution. Perfect for readers of Where the Crawdads Sing, The Four Winds, and A Girl Called Samson.

Virginia, 1749. Rosanna Waters is more comfortable catching grasshoppers for fishing bait than helping her Mama with the washing. After one defiance too many ends in terrible tragedy, Rosanna learns that her rebellious nature carries a price too steep to pay. She must tame the fire within—for her family’s sake, if not her own.

Then she meets Callum Stewart, a Scottish indentured servant with secrets as deep as the river she loves, Rosanna discovers someone who sees her for exactly who she is. But revolution changes everything. War sends Callum to battle and Rosanna into the unknowns of the South Carolina frontier, where she carves out a life from the unforgiving backcountry—eight children, a working farm, and a hard-won independence.

When the war finally arrives at her doorstep, it brings not just soldiers threatening everything she’s built, but the boy who stole her heart all those years ago—now a man with his own scars. As violence engulfs the frontier, Rosanna must decide how far she’s willing to go to protect her family, and whether the woman she’s become can make peace with the girl she used to be.

Based on a true story, this is an epic tale of a woman who refuses to surrender—not to grief, not to the wilderness, and never to a fate trying to break the spirit she’s finally learned to love.