I’m excited to share a glimpse of my complete manuscript, Radiance, currently querying.
Radiance explores the courage required to build a soft life after hard years. After a lifetime surviving her ex-husband's abuse and an archaic North Carolina family court system that fails her as often as it demands perfection, Rowan Whitaker achieves the impossible: a fresh start in an idyllic lakeside bungalow in Cooperstown, New York. Rowan’s hopes for a new life are modest. She wants a slower pace, new traditions, and enough stability to rebuild a sense of safety, especially for her two young daughters. Recovery proves as crooked as the winding, woodsy trails outside Rowan's new home. Fear and searing anger weigh Rowan down like a hiker's backpack, and her daughters struggle to navigate their own trauma responses.
Over time, Rowan leans into the close-knit community that embraces her. Friendships deepen into family, and Rowan accepts the notion that she is not alone. With solace and support, Rowan can once again feel joy, trust, purpose, and how to marvel at the beautiful landscape she now calls home. Past versions of herself reappear like old pals. She even learns to love again. But when her ex-husband is released from prison to house arrest with a clear intent to regain custody of their daughters, and the past she fought tooth and nail to escape takes aim for her once again, Rowan must choose between living in fear and fighting for the future she has finally begun to imagine.
Radiance is the first novel in the Cooperstown series.
“A dark suggestion of mountains rises in the distance, easing down into the vast, rippling water. Gentle waves lap at the rocky shore just in front of where Rowan stands. A few late night frogs and crickets sing their last calls for the night. Rowan takes a deep breath of the intoxicating air. A foreign emotion drifts through. Excitement? No. Wouldn’t that be embarrassing, the illogical thought pops into her head. More like an eagerness to better see the details of this view in the sunlight. She hasn’t allowed herself to marvel at anything aside from her daughters in years. Survival overtook everything inside of her. Survival and vigilance and endurance.”
“She lets her hands fall into her lap. ‘And when I try to explain what he's done, like really get into the nitty-gritty details, it sounds unbelievable because it was ridiculous. It was so irrational, so absurd, that people instinctively search for a version that makes more sense. They assume there is a logical compromise somewhere in the middle because it's easier to believe we both contributed than to accept that one person really was that terrible.’”
