Kat Smutz grew up in the Southern Appalachian Mountain, in a small North Georgia town. A love of history grew out of listening to her parents’ stories of growing up in an isolated region of the Smoky Mountains. She began writing in high school, an obsession that eventually led to a career in journalism with detours into engineering, law enforcement and teaching.

In 2009, Smutz retired to work on publishing some of the sixty-plus manuscripts she had written over the years. Her first three books were non-fiction works on the American Civil War, a subject she knows well after more than forty years as a civil war researcher.

Her first historical fiction, Silent Tears, is the story of an abused wife learning to stand on her own in a Victorian society that allowed women few rights.

Her next book, as yet untitled, is about a young woman who becomes separated from her family when the American Civil War erupts. She takes on the guise of a boy and earns her way by spying while she tries to find her way home. “As unlikely as the story sounds, hundreds of women dressed as men and joined the army during the civil war,”  Smutz points out. “Spies who were female weren’t at all uncommon.”

Frequent travel is part of life for Smutz, thanks to her husband’s career as a federal law enforcement officer. Home is wherever the job lands them, and it does provide opportunities to visit new places and meet new people, which inspire Smutz’s work.

Works by Kat Smutz

Non-Fiction
American Slavery In An Hour
American Civil War In An Hour
Abraham Lincoln In An Hour

Historical Fiction
Silent Tears

Contributed works
Clay County Heritage Book, recollections by descendants of Clay County, NC, pioneers

Water’s Edge, an anthology by the Evergreen Writers Group