A multi-generational story of loss and hope -- Bringing Maggie Home

"There is no one so damaged that grace can't redeem him.

That's one of the best things about God, I think.

He never sees us as too far gone."

"Do your best and trust God with the rest.

That's the way to find peace."

"God knows the best answer,

and he will reveal it at the right time." 

There are always inspirational gems to be mined from "gentle stories of hope" by the awesome Kim Vogel Sawyer.  These come from her latest novel,  Bringing Maggie Home.

Kim has previously written great historical fiction, as well as Mennonite fiction with both historical and contemporary settings.  Bringing Maggie Home represents a somewhat new direction for her, with the main story set in current time with flashbacks to events covering the lives of three generations of women in the same family.  As expected, Kim did a fantastic job with this new venture.

So many issues challenge the characters in this story.  From the beginning, you feel the tension and loss experienced by grandmother Hazel, her daughter Diane, and granddaughter Meghan.  Sometimes I wanted to shake one or more of them and force them to sit down and talk things out.  At other times, I found myself in tears as they worked through their issues, individually and together.

In her characteristic excellent writing style, Kim filled in the needed blanks in the women's lives as her story developed.  Twists and turns in the developments certainly helped keep the interest level high.  The end of the story . . . well, you will just have to read it for yourself to see how skillfully Kim concludes this engaging journey through time.

Thanks to Kim and her publisher for providing a copy of the book.  I was delighted to share my own thoughts in this review.

About the Book:

Decades of Loss, an Unsolved Mystery, and a Rift Spanning Three Generations

Hazel DeFord is a woman haunted by her past. While berry picking in a blackberry thicket in 1943, ten-year old Hazel momentarily turns her back on her three-year old sister Maggie and the young girl disappears.

Almost seventy years later, the mystery remains unsolved and the secret guilt Hazel carries has alienated her from her daughter Diane, who can’t understand her mother’s overprotectiveness and near paranoia. While Diane resents her mother’s inexplicable eccentricities, her daughter Meghan—a cold case agent—cherishes her grandmother’s lavish attention and affection.

When a traffic accident forces Meghan to take a six-week leave-of-absence to recover, all three generations of DeFord women find themselves unexpectedly under the same roof. Meghan knows she will have to act as a mediator between the two headstrong and contentious women. But when they uncover Hazel’s painful secret, will Meghan also be able to use her investigative prowess to solve the family mystery and help both women recover all that’s been lost?

About the Author:

KIM VOGEL SAWYER is a highly acclaimed, best-selling author with more than one million books in print, in seven different languages. Her titles have earned numerous accolades including the ACFW Carol Award, the Inspirational Readers' Choice Award, and the Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence. Kim lives in central Kansas with her retired military husband, Don, where she continues to write gentle stories of hope. She enjoys spending time with her three daughters and grandchildren.