An Amazon #1 Best Seller, Willows: The Creole is the third book in The Delegate series, a collection of independent novels written in first-person narrative by Cyndie Shaffstall, author of Seed Money: The Entrepreneur, Glyphs: The Scribe, and Chaos: The Oracle.
The Heir
The Arceneaux family has a long history of falling victim to circumstance--madness, embezzlement, even murder--but when the last of the unmarried females inherits the family plantation, she is determined their unfortunate legacy will end with her.
After her father is imprisoned in New York, she embarks on a new life in New Orleans with what is left of all the hope she can muster. What she finds is an abandoned house, a fractured family, and an oppressed people. Determined to find her own way, she confronts the challenges head on, and soon realizes change is not something needed only for her, but for many.
People of Color
In the decades before the Civil War, Louisiana was the most advanced state on the topic of freedom. People of color were successful in business and owned property--some of which they acquired through the gifts or wills of white fathers whose black and mulatto wives and mistresses exacted better lives for their children.
A Step Backward
The Civil War brought change--any black lineage became cause for discrimination, even in Louisiana--and many blacks and mixed-race persons were relegated to occupations not unlike those of their ancestors. Women, though white, were expected to be hostesses and leave business to men--especially the business of voting.
A Family Reunited
Willows Plantation, still worked by the descendants of the slaves who built it, becomes the anchor to affect change and in a historical fiction story spanning five generations, author Cyndie Shaffstall, takes you on a journey through abolition and suffrage efforts of the 1700s and 1800s. A Voodoo priestess, a French artist, the first woman presidential candidate, and the world's fair shed light on issues and provide opportunities to reunite and strengthen an entire family.
Each book of The Delegate series reads as though you've come across someone's journal. While you read, the saga envelopes you, and it becomes your journal, and your story, as you are transported through time.
About the Author: Cyndie Shaffstall, a quintessential entrepreneur in the software industry, wrote her first book in 1992, QuarkXPress: Making the Most of Your Negative Experiences, followed quickly by a dozen after-market computer manuals. In the years since, she has further contributed to the design and business industries as the editor and publisher of X-Ray Magazine and more recently, revealing some of her successful business practices in Small-business Guide to Winning at Web Marketing. Cyndie Shaffstall is a prolific writer of eBooks, case studies, press releases, blog articles, and other online content for her company, Spider Trainers--a provider of automated marketing--and as a contributing blogger to Target Marketing Magazine, among other print and electronic publications. Cyndie Shaffstall is the inventor and patent holder of Sassy Strappings, a fashion accessory. She lives in Denver with her two dogs, Felix Trinidad and Oscar de la Hoya--boxers.
