Lion on the Hearth is chronologically the sixth book in John Ehle’s seven-book Appalachian series that includes The Land Breakers, The Journey of August King, Time of Drums, The Road, The Winter People, and Last One Home.

Lion on the Hearth is the story of the King family, successful merchants in Great Depression-era Asheville, North Carolina, where trading, competing, and risk taking are necessary for survival, and where greed and lust for love and power tests the limits of a strong, ambitious family. 

About the Author

John Ehle (Ee-lee) is the author of seventeen books—eleven fiction and six nonfiction—including Trail of Tears: The Rise and Fall of the Cherokee Nation. His novel, The Land Breakers, first published in 1964 by Harper & Row, was the first in a seven-book series that begins with the settling of the Appalachian Mountains in western North Carolina in 1779.

Mr. Ehle is a member of the North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame, and has received the North Carolina Award for Literature, the Thomas Wolfe Prize, and the Lillian Smith Award for Southern Fiction. He is also a five-time winner of the Sir Walter Raleigh Award for Fiction. He has been recipient of the Mayflower Award for Nonfiction, the Governor's Award for Meritorious Service, and the John Tyler Caldwell Award for the Humanities. Mr. Ehle holds honorary doctorates from UNC-Chapel Hill, UNC-Asheville, the North Carolina School of the Arts, and Berea College.