I leave Jack and Cassie in the kitchen with Mom. I pick up Dad and take him to the living room. I set the urn on the mantel and step back to evaluate the placement.
“I think we’re going to be ok, Dad,” I say. “And don’t worry, I promise I won’t strap you in the front seat tomorrow and take you to the Christmas tree lot.”
Pick out a big one, Sweet Pea. Don’t worry if there are a few too many wonky branches. It’s better that way.
It’s amazing, how life is laid out. The way we have to ride through the laughter and the tears. How hope is a release into the space around everything that hurts, giving all our pain somewhere to go, so that peace can find its way home.
Acknowledgments
What a blessing it is to have an opportunity to thank people for helping me reach this part of my publishing journey. First, I thank and praise God for all the undeserved but so greatly appreciated blessings in my life, one of which is this book and the chance to see it in print.
I thank my husband, R.J. Burle, for his unfailing support and encouragement. People always ask me how I find the time to write amid raising four children, teaching, and keeping the day-to-day world of my family spinning. God gave me a partner in life and love who has my back at every turn, and as far as writing goes, that means graciously taking over household and kid duty while I head to a nearby bookstore to write.
I also thank my children, who don’t begrudge their mother the time to write and work toward a goal. I hope they will see it as an example of how important it is to pursue their own dreams, whatever they may be.
I thank my mother and father and well as my brother and sister—about whom this book is not. Except for the love—that part is true. Family is a delicate thing. If we’re lucky (and I was), we come out with an understanding of unconditional love and unflappable dedication. Family is our first knowledge of self and where we fit into this world. All my love and devotion to you, my first loves, always.
Thank you to the myriad writers who have helped me along the way, including Luke Whisnant, my first writing teacher at East Carolina University. Long had I held the secret desire to be a writer, but not until that first class did I believe it a real possibility. Thank you to my very first writer’s group: Luke, Heather Burt, Chip and the late Ann Sullivan, and some others who came and went along the way. Thank you to Judi Hill and all the writers at Wildacres Writer’s Workshop. Thank you to the Missouri writing groups who showed me the importance of having a trusted writing community as well as the value of having friends who write. Thank you, Samantha Redstreake Geary, my current writing partner in crime—I mean, fiction—for keeping my creative soul alive and well fed.
Thank you to my amazing agent, Julie Gwinn. I knew as soon as I saw your listing that you were the agent God had selected for me, and although I’m not right about much, I had that one pegged. I couldn’t be happier.
Thank you to Lisa Mangum, my editor, for falling in love with these characters and working on their behalf in a way that humbles and delights me, thus making this book everything I meant for it to be. Thank you to everyone at Shadow Mountain Publishing for make this dream come true, especially Heidi Taylor Gordon.
Thank you Malaprop’s Bookstore in Asheville, North Carolina, for letting me take up a seat in the café for hours at a time writing, plotting, planning, and dreaming. (I’m sitting here with a cup of coffee even now as I write these acknowledgments.)
And finally, although I already thanked Him (once is never enough), I give my undying gratitude to God for every breath I take. It’s all your design, and I am happy to be a part of it.
Discussion Questions
1. Mother and daughter relationships are central in this novel. What are some opportunities that Nina has either missed or taken in order to have a better relationship with her daughter as well as with her own mother? Where did Nina and her mother fail or succeed in their relationship?
2. The theme of fatherhood also runs throughout this story. Discuss the fathers in this novel and the roles they play. Discuss the roles that men play in a family as a whole and how their absence and/or presence is felt.
3. Family is the tie that binds, but those bonds can sometimes feel like restraints. Discuss the ways in which family ties are used in this story. To what degree are those constraints true or the product of misunderstandings?
4. In this novel, Nina wants desperately to achieve a goal that is out of her control. What role does Nina’s own desperation play in the demise of her marriage? Have you ever let your own desires for something negatively affect a relationship? Were you able to see it in time to save that connection? If so, how did you change the course of your thoughts and actions? If not, what would you do in hindsight to have kept the relationship intact?
5. Hindsight is 20/20. Characters often misunderstand each other throughout this story. What are some of the major misunderstandings or misconceptions that affected the lives of these characters?
6. Both Nina and Oliver are looking for the right path for their lives. Each has a hesitation that is brought on by fear. What fears are keeping them from their true paths? Have you ever hesitated to follow your true path because of fear? What was that path and the fear that kept you from
