ISBN-13: 9780310858263 UPC: 025986858261 Availability: In Stock
Publisher's Description
As a chalk-fingered child, I had worn my craving for Mama's love on my sleeve. But as I grew, that craving became cloaked in excuses and denial until slowly it sank beneath my skin to lie unheeded but vital, like the sinews of my framework. By the time I was a teenager, I thought the gap between Mama and me could not be wider. And then Danny came along. . . . A splendidly colored sidewalk. Six-year-old Celia presented the gift to her mother with pride---and received only anger in return. Why couldn't Mama love her? Years later, when once-in-a-lifetime love found Celia, her mother opposed it. The crushing losses that followed drove Celia, guilt-ridden and grieving, from her Bradleyville home. Now thirty-five, she must return to nurse her father after a stroke. But the deepest need for healing lies in the rift between mother and daughter. God can perform such a miracle. But first Celia and Mama must let go of the past--before it destroys them both.
Author Bio
Brandilyn Collins, known for her trademark Seatbelt Suspense, is the bestselling author of Violet Dawn, Coral Moon, Crimson Eve, Eyes of Elisha, and other novels. She and her family live in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. Visit her website at www.brandilyncollins.com and her blog at www.forensicsandfaith.blogspot.com
Publisher's Weekly
In this excellent novel for the inspirational market, Collins uses her talent
for suspense (Eyes of Elisha) in a more memoirlike tale that flashes back and
forth between the 1960s and the 1990s as it explores a mother/daughter
relationship. As the story opens, we find that 35-year-old Celia Matthews left
home 17 years before, sure that it was her harsh words that drove her little
brother, Kevy, from the house and prompted his bicycle accident. Wracked with
guilt, embittered toward her mother and conflicted about her botched romance
with Danny Cander, Celia shook the dust of small-town Bradleyville, Ky., off
her feet and crafted a life for herself as an account executive in Little
Rock, Ark. But her lack of mother-love isn't shaken off so easily. She bobs in
and out of several relationships, losing her faith and emotionally treading
water. Only when her father has a stroke and her mother pleads for help are
the wheels of reconciliation set in motion. The story is beautifully written
and the characters (whom readers will recognize from Collins's related
stand-alone novel Cast a Road Before Me) are well developed, although the
pacing drags in spots. The reason for Celia's lack of mother-love is not
explained as neatly as might be wished; conversely, the conclusion is like a
fairy tale, a contrivance that readers, depending on their tastes, may
appreciate or find disappointing in. Overall, this novel exemplifies how
Christian fiction is finally coming of age. (Mar.) Copyright 2001 Cahners
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