Secessia

New Orleans, May 1862. The largest city in the ill-starred confederacy has fallen to Union troops . When twelve-year-old Joseph Woolsack disappears from his home, her terrifies his mother Elise and enrages his father Angel. Joseph must come to grips with his father's legacy of violence, and his growing affection for his neighbor, the Cuban orphan girl Marina Fandal. Elise must struggle to maintain a hold on her sanity, her son and her station, but is threatened by the resurgence of a troubling figure from her past, Dr. Emile Sabatier, a fanatical physician who adores disease and is deeply mired in the conspiracy and intrigue surrounding the occupation of the city. These characters' paths all intersect with General Benjamin Butler of Massachusetts, a man who history will call a beast, but whose avarice and brutal acumen are ideally suited to the task of governing an "ungovernable city."