Manuscript Synopsis
Destination Hope
By: Charles J. Patricoff
Destination Hope is a five book series of historical fiction set before, during and after the American Civil War. The story targets an adult audience and follows the wartime experience of Nathaniel Thomas Graham, a near-pacifist minister from Nashville, Tennessee who becomes a Confederate Army Chaplain. Throughout this series, Nathaniel finds himself with many opportunities to share the Gospel of Christ while struggling with the issues that separate loved ones and the nation. Nathaniel questions the legitimacy of the newly formed Confederate Government. Is he in rebellion against God's appointed Federal Government? On what Biblical authority can he hold a “Brother-in-Christ” in bondage? The thought of killing a fellow Christian in the name of freedom frightens him. However, he is convinced that a sovereign State has the right of to govern itself and that a political minority should not abolish the constitutionally protected institution of slavery.
By: Charles J. Patricoff
Destination Hope is a five book series of historical fiction set before, during and after the American Civil War. The story targets an adult audience and follows the wartime experience of Nathaniel Thomas Graham, a near-pacifist minister from Nashville, Tennessee who becomes a Confederate Army Chaplain. Throughout this series, Nathaniel finds himself with many opportunities to share the Gospel of Christ while struggling with the issues that separate loved ones and the nation. Nathaniel questions the legitimacy of the newly formed Confederate Government. Is he in rebellion against God's appointed Federal Government? On what Biblical authority can he hold a “Brother-in-Christ” in bondage? The thought of killing a fellow Christian in the name of freedom frightens him. However, he is convinced that a sovereign State has the right of to govern itself and that a political minority should not abolish the constitutionally protected institution of slavery.
Eleanor Ellis of Rockford, Illinois is an idealistic young woman. She loses her father to the war and she will do anything to end it and bring her brothers, Paul and John, home safely. She is convinced that the “Union” is worth preserving, but at what cost. A local suitor, Jason Merritt, Esquire, argues that two nations at peace is better than one at war.
The first book, Separation, begins the wartime horrors for all touched by the war’s savagery. Nathaniel’s personal struggle will surface. The war will intensify, and he grows numb at the loss of many friends. The second book, Emancipation centers on the pivotal battle at Antietam and President Lincoln’s proclamation. On the firing line, Nathaniel faces Union men he knows and he is forced to make hard life or death choices. Eleanor becomes active in the war effort much to the disapproval of family and friends. In the third story, Consolation, all characters suffer bearing the bitter winter of 1863, clashing at Chancellorsville, and colliding at Gettysburg, where Nathaniel suffers a crippling wound. Eleanor begins a quest to find her brothers and discovers compassion for the enemy.
In the fourth book, Liberation, captured Nathaniel spends the rest of the war in a Federal prison camp where he receives clarity to his personal struggle. President Lincoln's Gettysburg Address moves him to consider that maybe all men are created equal, and that maybe man does not have perfect-collective wisdom to decide who is, or who is not, a human being. He faces strong and bitter attitudes in prison more than he encountered on battlefields, and he will learn first hand how easily one group of people can dehumanize another. Eventually he sees that the war is a physical manifestation of a spiritual reality, a fight between light and darkness. He must choose between pursuing vengeance, a better life, or a better hope. Eleanor intensifies her efforts to end the bloody conflict and she works feverously to ensure a favorable outcome for the presidential election of 1864.
After President Lincoln’s assassination and the war’s end, Nathaniel begins a new life with new challenges in a nation reborn and a southern community in desperate need of reconstruction. He is dedicated to Reconciliation, the final book and leg of his journey to Destination Hope.
