“I read this book for the first time when I was 13. I loved it and reread it again right away. I thought it was so sad and romantic. But it was also real to me, as my great grandfather was born during the end of the civil war and they lived in Jackson, the area that Tara was in. He had a saw mill too. They lived in a house that was built just before the civil war, One with wide porches, white clap board and huge two story columns and wide inside hallways from front to back that let the breeze ease through. I only visited there a few time before I was thirteen, but it was as if the past was alive for me. All of the book was real. Better than any movie I have ever seen then or now.”