Don't Cross the X

Don't Cross the X is a heartbreaking story of a woman's tragic life after crossing paths with the local witch. In 1919, twenty-two-year-old Pearl Hayes leads a blessed life with her husband and two sons in rural South Carolina. But when she crosses a large X etched into the dirt near a local blackberry field, she comes to find that she has entered into the realm of a force of evil she has no hope of stopping. Slowly, her life deteriorates, and through her misery she knows who is to blame: Hazel Sullivan-who is known, to the town of Walterboro, as a witch. Eighty-two years later, in 2001, Pearl Hayes can no longer remember her past-all that she knows is the grief and longing she feels deep in her wounded heart. Then, when her estranged granddaughter and great-granddaughter come to visit her at her nursing home, the memories of her prior life come rushing back to her. At the end of her harrowing life, Pearl is desperate to tell her story to what is left of her family, and to deliver a warning: that the evil that took her life from her will come to take theirs, too. Evocative, poignant, and heartbreaking, Don't Cross the X illustrates the indomitable strength of the human spirit in the face of despair.