Based primarily in post-Civil War Florida, Beneath the Palms is a fragmentary fictional work following a cast of characters who, over the course of 80 years, breathe life into the place called Florida. The country had been torn by the Civil War, but Florida had been far removed from the fighting and from the politics. Few people lived there, many of the original settlers having been killed by the Seminoles, most of whom were, in turn, slaughtered...