Tomorrow We Reap

Thirty years after the Civil War, unscrupulous Northern industrialists cast their greedy eyes on the abundant resources of the South and attempted to reap the profits while sealing off the poor and forgotten in a corner room of a house still divided.  In Tomorrow We Reap, authors Street and Childers dust away the cobwebs from this little known period of Southern history and superbly interweave the continuing saga of the Dabney family with the encroachment of Yankee industrial giants.  Unlike past conflicts, however, it isn't guns and cannons that threaten the Valley of Lebanon, but sugar-coated half-truths and plump bags of gold. 

 

     In the 1890s, descendants of Sam'l Dabney are still respected and prominent figures in  Lebanon, Mississippi and life has been peaceful and mostly untroubled since the family's attempt to establish an independent republic during the Civil War.  But the arrival of the Peninsula Company, a merciless and shady Yankee industry, is about to challenge the Dabney's treasured way of life.  It is a battle between honesty and double dealing ― price wars, company stores, buying on credit, the lure of silk clothes for those who can't afford it, and a railroad right-of-way not meant to be shared.    


Although three generations are represented in this story, Tomorrow We Reap is principally the story of the oldest son of Bruce and Kyd Dabney ― Big Sans Dabney, a man as steadfast as the rock and trees and sky, yet the son most resistant to change and the one responsible for the direction they all would take. Little by little, members of the Dabney clan realize that they can not always live in their easy, casual way,  but can draw strength from the past and the generations of strong and independent men and women who bravely paved the way.  


      A peak at a little known period of U.S. history, impeccable research, characters who leap off the page, romance, and a depiction of the rural South as only the pen of a Southerner can describe it.