Lawanda Ingle is determined to be the first person in her family to attend college and get out of Cardin, Kentucky, but there's no money, so she decides to earn her own way. While trying to sell magazine subscriptions, she meets Amos Garland, an alcoholic veteran who lives in a home fashioned from two old school buses crammed with books. They become friends in spite of her family's disapproval, but when Garland's bus is broken into and his journal is recovered by the sheriff, its rambling entries include incriminating descriptions of Lawanda. Garland is arrested for public drunkenness and is held for corrupting a minor. With a Hammer for My Heart is the story of healing, redemption and social responsibility.
Two important themes in the literary work of George Ella Lyon are the ideas of community and family. Her books typically focus on characters that discover a kinship with people of other places and other times. Through imagination and inspiration, her characters can relate to the issues of people who came before them or who live in other lands and thereby gain insights into their own problems. At the same time, George Ella Lyon explores the many relationships found within family and how these help or hinder a character's understanding of him or herself.
