'Varina' imagines the life of Jefferson Davis's widow in the aftermath of the Civil War

“I’ve come to accept that our debt may stretch to one of those generational Bible curses,” says Varina Davis, the title character in Varina, Charles Frazier’s new novel. The wife of Confederate President Jefferson Davis is speaking about the debt her husband owes for lives lost in the Civil War. But she’s also speaking of her own debt, as someone who enjoyed the benefits of a society built on the backs of enslaved people.

Frazier follows to a large degree the historical record