- Mary Alice Monroe, New York Times Bestselling author
"Beautifully written...a great book club pick!"
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A HAND TO HOLD IN DEEP WATER
Shawn's Debut Novel
Willy Cherrymill and his stepdaughter Lacey are deeply bruised by a past brimming with unanswered questions. It’s been thirty years since May DuBerry, Willy’s young wife and Lacey’s mother, abandoned them both leaving Willy to raise Lacey alone.
Lacey Cherrymill is smart, stubborn and focused. She’s also a single mother to a young daughter recently diagnosed with a devastating illness. The last thing she needs to think about right now is the betrayal that rocked her childhood. Reluctantly, she has returned to her rural beginnings, a former dairy farm in the Maryland countryside, and to Willy, a man steeped in his own disappointments and all the guilt that goes with them.
Together they will pool their wobbly emotional resources to take care of Tasha, all the while trying to skirt the issue of May’s mysterious disappearance. But try as she might, Lacey can’t leave it alone. Just where is May DuBerry Cherrymill and why did she leave them, and how is it that they have never talked about the wreckage she left behind?
THE PRECIOUS JULES
After nearly 200 years of housing retardants, as they were once known, the Rosewood Institute is closing the doors on its dark history, and the complicated task of reassigning residents has begun. An adult Ella Jules, having arrived decades earlier at the tender age of seven, must rely on the state to decide her future. Ella’s aging parents have requested she be returned to her childhood home, much to the distress of Ella’s siblings, but more so to Lynetta, her beloved caretaker who has been by her side for decades. The five adult Jules children haunted by the earliest memories of their sister, each dealing with the trauma of her banishment in their own flawed way, are converging on the family home, secrets in tow, arriving from the far corners of the country to talk some sense into their aging parents and get to the root of this inexplicable change of heart.
The Precious Jules examines the thin line between selfishness and what passes for love. This family story asks what is best for one child in light of what is perceived as the greater good, and just what is the collective legacy of deep family secrets, shame, and helplessness. The Precious Jules is a deeply felt family narrative that will make you fall in love with these flawed and imperfect characters standing on the threshold of an awakening they never expected.
About
Shawn Nocher
Shawn Nocher (pronounced “No-Shay”) is a multiple Pushcart Award nominee for her short stories and the author of the critically acclaimed novels A Hand to Hold in Deep Water and The Precious Jules. Her short stories and nonfiction articles have been published in SmokeLong Quarterly, Pithead Chapel, MoonPark Review, Moon City Review, Writer’s Digest, Electric Literature, and The Forge Literary Magazine, among others. Her novels have been selected as a PopSugar monthly pick, Portland Review of Books monthly pick, and long-listed for the Crook's Corner Prize for debut Southern fiction. She teaches in the Master of Arts writing program at Johns Hopkins University, is the co-founder of Love in The Trenches, has given wings to two children, and lives with her husband and an assortment of sassy rescue animals in Baltimore, Maryland, where she writes in a room of her own.
HOST YOUR OWN BOOK CLUB
I love a book club. Seriously, I really do. I’d love to be a guest at your book club, either virtually or in person. I’m available for in-person book discussions in the Maryland, Virginia, Delaware area (but I’m also an enthusiastic traveler so don’t hesitate to ask if I’ll be in your area in the future).
BUY THE BOOK
Buy the Book:
https://www.blackstonepublishing.com
https://www.audioeditions.com/
Bookstores can place orders by sending an email to Indieorders@Blackstonepublishing.com, or through Edelweiss for discounted copies and free shipping.