Child H

Six-year-old Hannah Campbell woke to a house gone strange.
They found a cigarette butt beside her bed. Her father's friend was gone.
Before noon, the sheriff had been called.
Hannah remembered nothing.

The law called her the victim of a grave offense. Evangelist Silas Wade said God had preserved her for a higher purpose.

They called her Child H to protect her identity. But everyone knew who Hannah was.
Hannah knew only that H was her letter.

As word of what happened spread from churches to newspapers and across county lines, Hannah’s silence became something other people claimed for themselves. Some called it a miracle. Some saw it as a sign. Some believed they knew what God intended for her life.

Hannah grew up beneath the weight of a story she could not remember and a name she never chose.

Set among the farms, churches, and hidden mountain communities of The Glens, Child H is a haunting Appalachian novel about memory, faith, silence, and one woman’s right to decide what her life will mean.

From Brenda K. Thompson, winner of the 2026 Next Generation Indie Book Awards Grand Prize for Fiction for Alice Anyway, and author of A Feed Sack Dress for Sadie and Ivaleena.