Sharon Davies is a professor of law at the Ohio State University, where she teaches Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure (Police Practices), and Evidence. Her work of narrative non-fiction, "Rising Road: A True Tale of Love, Race, and Religion in America," tells the story of a Methodist minister named Edwin Stephenson who in 1921 shot and killed a Catholic priest, James Coyle, in broad daylight in Birmingham, Alabama. The saga in the Jim Crow South weaves through the resulting trial, funded in large part by the Ku Klux Klan, and explores how race and religion were used on behalf of the defense.

Davies, who as a lawyer is more accustomed to writing legal documents, visits Writers Talk to share the challenges she faced while writing an historical novel.