Written more than a century ago, The Valley of Shadows is a passionate recounting of Grierson’s experiences as a boy growing up on the prairies of central Illinois in the few short years leading up to the Civil War. Set in a region that was neither north nor south; neither for nor against slavery, it foreshadows the coming of a bitter conflict that would divide families and set neighbors against one another.

Thrust into this turbulent setting is the Shepard family. Immigrants from England, they find themselves swept up into the abolition movement when their small family farm becomes an unexpected stop on the Underground Railroad. The preacher’s sermon, “For they shall cry unto the lord because of the oppressors, and he shall send them a savior and a great one, and he shall deliver them,” heralds the arrival of several runaway slaves and the strange twists that work together to help them on their journey to freedom.

Presented in the vernacular of the time, The Valley of Shadows uniquely depicts and conveys the superstitious influences that pervaded the prairie; the sense of isolation; the firm religious conviction; and the feeling of powerlessness to avert the ceaseless march towards cataclysm. It is an intimate portrait of prairie life complete with the epic personalities of the local settlers. Elihu Gest, known as the Load-Bearer, has earned his nickname by his constant efforts to assume other people’s mental and spiritual burdens. Zack Caverly, known as Socrates, is indeed a Socrates of the prairie in looks as well as in speech. The Jordans and the Busbys; the staunch Abolitionist Isaac Snedeker; and Lem Stephens who joins the slave catchers in their search. Characters as large as these are not fictional for this is a true story that provides an appreciation and a rare insight into the very nature of the settler’s life on the great frontier during the antebellum period.