(typewriter ding) Harmonica music - I am Jayne Anne Phillips, and this is "Night Watch."

It starts nine years after the Civil War in 1874.

It's a family story about a mother and daughter, and they're going on a journey to the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum.

I wanted to go back and write about our own civil war in a way that was very, very deeply personal.

It was about the effects on the populace, the civilians, as well as the soldiers.

We all encounter trauma in our lives, but part of the nature of the book is that these constant journeys continue.

People are trying to find their families again, and they persist despite all.

- The major setting in this book is an asylum, a mental institution.

And I have to admit, I had no idea that there were even such things in 1874 when you started looking into doing this book.

Did you know this already?

- Well, I grew up about 20 minutes from West and West Virginia, which is where the Trans-Allegheny lunatic asylum was built.

It was the first major allocation of funds that Virginia had ever made in the state.

There were no roads, there were no canals, there was nothing.

So, that was a piece of the book that I really wanted to emphasize.

Many people don't know about moral treatment, which was a kind of humane treatment for the mentally ill.

In 1852, Thomas Story Kirkbride was the most powerful psychiatrist in America, and he wrote a book about how to build asylums.

And every state at that time was encouraged to build one of these vast Kirkbride buildings for their state.

And the irony at the heart of Night Watch is that within the asylum, moral treatment reigned and it was a place of healing, whereas the world outside was a very brutal world.

- Well, Jayne Anne, it has been such a pleasure and congratulations again.

- Thank you.

- And thank you for watching A Word on Words.

I'm Jeremy Finley.

Remember, keep reading.

- [Jayne] The whole idea of a night watch is that all of us look out for one another and look out for our communities and our families.