..". heartwarming and a pleasure to read. Carrington's struggles were portrayed with almost painful realism, and the well-rounded characters really brought the book to life."
-Joanne Starer, Editorial Consultant

The beating-just one of many-was particularly vicious. Carrington's face was a bloodied and bruised mess after her mother's latest drunken outburst. Carrington had finally had enough. The resourceful fourteen-year-old knew she had to escape the dismal bungalow she shared with her half-sister and mother. Her mother was always out drinking with various boyfriends anyway, and her...

Carrington Coyle's life as a young adult is full of promise: a new career as a teacher and potential romances with two different men, both of whom she finds attractive and exciting. She still struggles with being the child of an abusive, alcoholic mother, however, and her residual anger and crushing self-doubt simmer in a rage just beneath her cheery exterior. While her relationship with her grandmother, A.C., is full of closeness and love, she and her younger half-sister, Melissa, remain in a tense stalemate with jealousy and abandonment issues keeping them at arm's length. When her...