BOOK REVIEW: The Beautiful Daughters - Nicole Baart

The Beautiful Daughters by Nicole Baart
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

You can run from your past for only so long. For every five steps forward you take, your past takes six, until the distance between tomorrow, today and yesterday is no more than the space between heartbeats.

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Harper has a secret.

One that only three people in the whole world know. One of those three can't reveal Harper's secret... at least not any longer. Another won't reveal Harper's secret because to do so would reveal his own secret, and he will go to any lengths to prevent that. And the third person...?

She doesn't know yet that the secret she possesses is not the secret she is hiding.

She doesn't know yet that time and distance cannot stop the power of a secret.

She doesn't know yet that no amount of penance can still the power of a secret.

But she is about to find out. And when she does, the carefully-crafted life that she has now will be irrevocably changed.

Harper has a secret.

But she is not the only one.

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Adri has a secret.

One that only three people in the whole world know. One of those three can't reveal Adri's secret... at least not any longer. Another won't reveal Adri's secret because to do so would reveal her own, something she is determined to prevent the disclosure of. And the third person...?

She doesn't know yet that the secret she possesses is not the secret she is hiding.

She doesn't know yet that time and distance cannot stop the power of a secret.

She doesn't know yet that no amount of penance can still the power of a secret.

She is about to find out. And when she does, the carefully-crafted life that she has painstakingly built will be changed, and there is no turning back.

Adri has a secret.

But she is not the only one.

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In The Beautiful Daughters, the hugely talented writer Nicole Baart combines her gift for rich, textured prose with her gift of compassion and empathy for the human condition to weave a tale that is both as old as time itself and as new and fresh as this morning's sunrise.

The Beautiful Daughters is the story of two daughters... daughters not by blood, but by a bond as strong as blood. It is a story of secrets. It is a story of penance. Of redemption. And second chances.

The Beautiful Daughters is the poignantly moving and powerful story of two young women and their journey through present and past to find their future.

With her keen understanding of the human condition and a seemingly bottomless well of compassion for humanity in all its shades, Nicole tackles a subject that – sorry, no spoilers here! – will make some people uncomfortable. But, as Nicole knows all too well, fiction is a reflection of reality… one that is sometimes sharper and more defined… and writers are more than just storytellers. We are chroniclers of humanity.

I recommend The Beautiful Daughters without reservation. This is a story that will stay with you long after the last page has been turned.

Thank you,

Veronica Marie Lewis-Shaw
16 August 2015
(Writing under a large mushroom somewhere in the Pacific Northwest)




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OUT OF THE CLUTTER OF A WRITER'S MIND - Perspective... It Is What It Is... Or Is It?

© 2015 – Veronica Marie Lewis-Shaw

“Nobody sees the world the way you do.” – Nicole Baart

That is probably a writer’s greatest truth.  Or at least right up there near the top of the truth list.  I like what writer and author, Nicole Baart says in her blog about how each of us brings our own perspective to the world - As You See It - Nicole Baart | Author.  We do… we all have stories to tell and each one of us brings with our stories the colorings and shadings of our own unique perspective on and of the world.

So why then are we often hesitant to share?  Why do we think our story isn’t “good enough”? 

This isn’t something that plagues only the debut writer; accomplished and much-published authors suffer the same ‘affliction’ on occasion.  Once we accept our ‘uniqueness’ and what that can bring to a story, we should want, as Nicole wrote, to “shout it from the rooftops!”.

I think it is often more than just a belief that our story isn’t ‘good enough’.  

I believe for many of us, it is the sudden and certain knowledge that we are revealing more of ourselves than we are comfortable with.  Writers, like actors, musicians and other artists, have a fairly healthy, if slightly-inflated, ego and a desire to be seen and heard… to share our craft… our vision of a part of the world that has captured our attention.

But are we ready to share a part of our soul?  A glimpse inside of us that we have, until now, revealed only to a lover?  Are we ready to reveal, even obliquely, a dark part of our past that until now we’ve kept hidden away in an old wooden cigar box way back in the corner of a seldom used closet, up on the top shelf under a pile of out of fashion cardigans?

As adults, there is an intimacy in our writing that is sometimes not as easily shared as when we regaled our fifth grade class with stories of our family camping trip in the Tetons.

And that gives us pause.

As it should. 

Reflection isn’t just what one sees in a mirror or the still water of a cold mountain lake before the sun rises too high and turns the vibrant colors of morning to midday pastels.

It reminds us why we write.  Why we took up this craft that has the potential for fame or infamy… for wealth or penury… for celebrity or solitude.

There are probably as many reasons why we write as there are stars in the sky.  Each of us has our own particular reason or reasons.  For some it is to share the blessings in and of their lives.  For others, writing is a penance… a tether to a past that won’t let go.

Writing is our raison d'etre.

We write to be remembered. 

We write to be remembered for our stories.

 

Our stories may have bits and bits of ourselves, our past and our present, but the stories themselves are not about us.  They are stories of a female police detective with a past… a New York City private eye bringing his own justice to an unjust world…  a young woman who finds her own grace through the ones that love her unconditionally.

Hmm... I seem to have drifted a bit from the topic at hand.  Let me close with this...

We will always see ourselves as less ‘interesting’ than others see us.

And a little humility is not a bad thing for a writer.

It helps keep things in perspective.

~

© 2015 – Veronica Marie Lewis-Shaw

(writing under a large mushroom somewhere in the Pacific Northwest)