A soul-stirring novel about the bonds between mother and child and the redemption that comes with facing the past and letting it go.
Thirty-two-year-old Jess Abbot has lost everything: her job, her apartment, and—most heart-wrenching—her eight-year-old son, Chance, to a tragic accident. Haunted by memories and grief, Jess packs what’s left and heads for the small mountain town of Pine Lake, where she takes a position as caregiver to an eccentric old woman.
A rumored clairvoyant, Lucy is strange but welcoming and immediately intuits Jess as a “loose end” in need of closure. But Jess isn’t the only guest in Lucy’s large Victorian home. There’s also Star, a teenage runaway with a secret too painful to share. And the little boy with heart-shaped stones, who comes with a hope for reconciliation—and a warning.
Soon Jess learns that she’s not the only lost soul running from the ghosts of the past. She and Star have been brought together for a reason: to be saved by the very thing that destroyed them.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Thirty-two-year-old Jess Abbot has lost everything: her job, her apartment, and—most heart-wrenching—her eight-year-old son, Chance, to a tragic accident. Haunted by memories and grief, Jess packs what’s left and heads for the small mountain town of Pine Lake, where she takes a position as caregiver to an eccentric old woman.
A rumored clairvoyant, Lucy is strange but welcoming and immediately intuits Jess as a “loose end” in need of closure. But Jess isn’t the only guest in Lucy’s large Victorian home. There’s also Star, a teenage runaway with a secret too painful to share. And the little boy with heart-shaped stones, who comes with a hope for reconciliation—and a warning.
Soon Jess learns that she’s not the only lost soul running from the ghosts of the past. She and Star have been brought together for a reason: to be saved by the very thing that destroyed them.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Praise for this book
"A compelling story of hidden secrets and the forgiveness that finds us when we least expect it." - Kerry Anne King
"If Alice Hoffman had written The Shack, it would’ve turned out like The Secret of Lost Stones…an otherworldly, beautiful tale in which people who are grieving and lonely get the chance to find their way home. But will they take it?" - Wendy Webb
"Stories of loss are often moving, but rarely are they as fulfilling and redemptive as this stirring debut…Payne spins a fast-paced tale full of tenderness and sparked with magic, illustrating how the future can transcend the past, and proving that forgiveness is the greatest virtue." - Sonja Yoerg
"If Alice Hoffman had written The Shack, it would’ve turned out like The Secret of Lost Stones…an otherworldly, beautiful tale in which people who are grieving and lonely get the chance to find their way home. But will they take it?" - Wendy Webb
"Stories of loss are often moving, but rarely are they as fulfilling and redemptive as this stirring debut…Payne spins a fast-paced tale full of tenderness and sparked with magic, illustrating how the future can transcend the past, and proving that forgiveness is the greatest virtue." - Sonja Yoerg
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Used availability for Melissa Payne's The Secrets of Lost Stones