Author Philip Gerard to focus on life in NC during Civil War in library talk

The received wisdom about life in North Carolina during the Civil War is not nearly as interesting as what actually happened, says author PhilipGerard.

Hot off a popular series of articles in Our State focusing on personal and thematic elements of the war, Gerard will talk about his discoveries at 7 p.m. Thursday, December 13, at the Asheboro library.

The talk is free and open to the public.

Gerard is the author of many historical novels set in North Carolina, including Cape Fear Rising and Hatteras Light. He has also written nonfiction books addressing topics ranging from the history of the schooner yacht Brilliant (Brilliant Passage) to World War II Germany (Secret Soldiers).

He is the chair of the department of creative writing at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, and lectures widely on the art and craft of writing history-based stories.

His book Creative Nonfiction: Researching Stories of Real Life is a standard in college classrooms across the country.

Gerard’s appearance it is part of Civil War 150: Exploring the War and Its Meaning Through the Words of Those Who Lived It, a national programming initiative in recognition of the war’s sesquicentennial presented by The Library of America in partnership with The Gilder Lehrman Institute of America, supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

The library is locate at 201 Worth Street in Asheboro.