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Black Pearls Magazine Presents the Book of the Month

Children of the Waters: A Novel by Carleen Brice

The author of the #1 Denver Post bestseller and Essence Book Club Pick Orange Mint and Honey explores the connection between love and race, and what it really means to be a family. AUTHOR BIO Carleen Brice’s debut novel, Orange Mint and Honey (One World/Ballantine), was an Essence “Recommended Read” and a Target “Bookmarked Breakout Book.” For this book, she won the 2009 First Novelist Award from the Black Caucus of the American Library Association and the 2008 Break Out Author Award at the African American Literary Awards Show. Her second novel, Children of the Waters (One World/Ballantine), a book about race, love and family, is available now where ever books are sold. If you don't see it at your local retailer, please go to the representive and request it. You can read an excerpt at her website www.carleenbrice.com.

Trish Taylor’s white ancestry never got in the way of her love for her black ex-husband, or their mixed race son, Will. But when Trish’s marriage ends, she returns to her family’s Denver, Colorado home to find a sense of identity and connect to her past. What she finds there shocks her to the very core: her mother and newborn sister were not killed in a car crash as she was told. In fact, her baby sister, Billie Cousins, is now a grown woman; her grandparents had put her up for adoption, unwilling to raise the child of a black man. Billie, who had no idea she was adopted, wants nothing to do with Trish until a tragedy in Billie’s own family forces her to lean on her surprisingly supportive and sympathetic sister. Together they unravel age-old layers of secrets and resentments and navigate a path toward love, healing, and true reconciliation.


Children of the Waters: A Novel by Carleen Brice
One World/Ballantine; Price $14.00
Pub date: June 23, 2009 ISBN: 978-0345499073


EXCERPT: PROLOGUE

Time was short. Maxine Kuepper was starting to say things she didn’t mean. Yesterday, she told her granddaughter to Move my dish, when she wanted to ask her to bend her leg. Trish stared, stumped and afraid, yet all Maxine could do was yell the word “dish” over and over knowing that she wasn’t making any sense. Cell by cell, bone by bone, Maxine was floating away. She didn’t know if it was the cancer or the medication that made her say such things. She was wearing a patch that released heavy doses of relief into her bloodstream, and still the littlest weight on her, like a sheet or the cotton nightgowns they dressed her in, hurt. The nurse promised that when the time came Maxine wouldn’t have any pain. “We’ll snow you out,” the nurse assured her. “Don’t worry.” Maxine would die the way her daughter did: like a mermaid swimming at the bottom of an ocean of drugs. It was small comfort after all these years to believe that Jocelyn hadn’t been in any pain when she died. Jocelyn. Such a cultivated name for a daughter who would not be tamed.

They were coming for her, Jocelyn and John, her husband, both dead. She dreamed of them so much now that sometimes she could swear they were really here in this room, whispering their secrets to her. They were coming for her. If they weren’t already here, she knew they were just over the other side waiting. And even though she was only sixty years old and her granddaughter Trish was only seventeen, she was ready to join them. But she had one last thing she had to do. She had secrets of her own to tell. She looked at the Polaroid picture she’d kept hidden for thirteen years.

Not even John knew she had proof of this moment. There was Jocelyn, blond and movie-star gorgeous even after just giving birth, holding the baby, only hours old with a cap of thick dark hair. And Trish, smiling wide, skin, teeth and hair white as cream, on the hospital bed next to them. Both girls marked with a stain that couldn’t be washed away. Maxine wished she had done things differently. But wishes are for the living. She sighed and pain rippled through her as her lungs pushed up against the battlefield of her ribs and the space where her left breast used to be. She raised the pen with the same amount of exertion that it used to take to lift a gallon of milk and began to write. The nurse said don’t worry. But how could she not?

What would they think of her? Would they hate her or would they be glad to know the truth? Probably both. But she would do this one last thing for them. She would make things right. As soon as Trish came home, Maxine would give her the letter. I should have told you this a long time ago, she wrote to her granddaughter, putting everything that was in her battered heart onto the page so that when the time came cowardice wouldn’t seal her lips. Each word, a lifetime. Just as she finished, she heard the front door open and close. Or she thought she did. Lately it was hard to tell what sounds were real and what sounds were memories sweeping over her like ocean waves.

But if it was Trish coming in, Maxine knew she did not have the strength to see the look on her granddaughter’s face after she read this letter. She didn’t have the strength to answer the question she knew would come no matter how hard she tried to explain: How could you? She opened the box, put the letter and photo inside, and replaced the lid. After she was gone, Trish would find everything she needed to know. When Maxine was buried, her lies would be unearthed. It wouldn’t be long now. She was sipping life from a glass that was neither half empty, nor half full, a glass emptying so rapidly she could see it in the eyes of the hospice nurses and the few friends who came to visit her at home.

The bedroom door opened, and Trish poked her head in. “Nana, you awake?” Maxine nodded, thinking For now, and, Please God let them forgive me.


------------------

Carleen Brice, Author of Children of the Waters, June 2009 www.carleenbrice.com


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Featured Book Release Spotlight: No Matter What! by Lisa Nichols

From bestselling author and motivational speaker Lisa Nichols comes a unique and powerful inspirational program that will both move you and empower you to realize your dreams. Millions are trying to live by The Secret's Law of Attraction, but the truth is it won't work unless you flex your all-important "bounce-back" muscles, which give you the ability to successfully navigate life's speed bumps.

By developing and toning her own bounce-back muscles at critical points in her life, Lisa found the power to become her authentic self and achieve everything she dared to hope for. Now, in NO MATTER WHAT, she offers a groundbreaking program that outlines these 9 Steps or "muscles", which include among others your Confidence, Faith-in-Myself, Honesty Out Loud and Forgiveness muscles, and explains how anyone can use them to achieve happiness and off-the-charts success.

Click on the big blue arrow to get started. Make sure to view all the videos in the series for great book previews. You can find other great book videos here.
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FEATURED BOOK OF THE MONTH
Raising Him Alone Book - Things Black Women Can Do to Raise Boys to be Men by David Miller and Matthew P. Stevens

Raising Him Alone is a proud provider of valuable resources that support single mothers raising boys. Please revisit our site soon as we will be offering some beneficial products for online purchase.


Raising Him Alone is more than just a book. It is a source of inspiration for the millions of single mothers who struggle daily with the challenges of raising healthy and productive boys to become responsible men.

The book is based on hundreds of interviews, focus groups and discussions with single mothers who are raising boys.

Additionally, many fathers were interviewed who desperately want to be in their sons lives, but are excluded from the process for a myriad of reasons.

Raising Him Alone (book) honors the struggles of single mothers raising boys through providing daily lessons that range from talking to boys about sex to assisting mothers with the process of dating.

Many of the statistics on Black men and boys are painful and are often daunting. For example, the most recent report on graduation rates among African American males published by the Schott Foundation indicates that in many US cities African American males are dropping out at rates that exceed 65%. The cities include but are not limited to Indianapolis, Detroit and Baltimore. With the lowest graduation rates in the nation among African American males, Indianapolis and Detroit’s graduation rates can only be viewed as a public health concern.

We rarely hear about the countless numbers of mothers who are successfully raising boys alone. The book underscores the need for mothers to be more willing than ever to sacrifice to support positive Black male development. This sacrifice includes developing a greater understanding of contemporary issues that effect Black males as well as getting mothers and fathers to be willing to reconcile old wounds.

The book serves as a voice of reason that tells us how important it is to rescue our boys from failing communities and failing schools.

Finally, we hope that Raising Him Alone (book) compels mothers to band together to address the challenges of being a single mother. After reading Raising Him Alone, please make sure you pass this book along to other mothers who can benefit from the lessons and the wisdom of others who have successfully navigated the world of being a single parent.

Visit the website to order books and for more information:

http://www.raisinghimalone.com/

In SCHAE'S STORY: A Woman's Transformation, author Angelia Menchan, readers will see the unveiling of a woman everyone thought they knew. We will be exposed to how difficult it is for the people around us to accept our desire to change. Also, that while many people preach that God will change someone’s life they really do not believe it to be true. Schae’s Story will also expose the many ways in which love manifests itself in a woman’s life, family love, community-love and most importantly the reciprocal love of God. For more info visit the author's website: www.angeliavmenchan.com

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SLS Paradigm Shift: Moving Literature Upward

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