Why did you choose this book? What were your expectations? Why did you expect what you did? How is the book living up to your expectations?

I am reading On Agate Hill by Lee Smith, published in 2006.

This book was given to me for my birthday or possibly Christmas several years ago. It was most likely picked out by the giver because the heroine's name is very similar to my own, so he/she thought I would enjoy reading something about a girl with a similar name. It is the fictional diary of a young girl living with her uncle after being orphaned by the American Civil war. So far, it is almost exactly what I was expecting. Almost all of her immediate family is dead, and her uncle just lost his wife giving birth to their son, who also died. The girl seems too young to understand the loss that her uncle is feeling. At the very discusses the jobs she did for her mother when she was dying, and then says that she was glad when she died. I predict that by the end of the book she will have matured greatly.