Homecoming

Zusatztext "Uplifting." --Library Journal "Belva Plain writes with authority and integrity." --San Francisco Chronicle A Main Selection of the Literary Guild Informationen zum Autor Belva Plain Klappentext With unerring insight and emotional power! Belva Plain! in her extraordinary novel! tells the story of a family divided and of the proud matriarch who takes a bold last stand to unite her warring children in what may be their last Homecoming. It is a crisp December day when Annette Byrne walks to the end of her long! curving driveway and drops five sealed envelopes into the mailbox! quickly! before second thoughts stay her hand. Shortly thereafter! with the holidays approaching! her estranged family will be gathered at her country estate for the first time in years. The sons. . . two brothers embittered by a breach of ethics! honor! and trust. The grandchildren. . . one young couple on the verge of divorce; another! lovingly united against the parents who have tarnished their lives. As the ill-fated meeting hurtles toward a bitter and abrupt conclusion! not even Annette Byrne's indomitable will can heal the rift--until a shattering event alters the landscape forever. Leseprobe The desktop was always covered with mail, incoming and outgoing.  Appeals from charities, politicians, whether federal, state, or town, bills and letters from scattered friends, all came flowing.  Sometimes it seemed to Annette that the whole world made connection with her here and asked for response. She picked up the pen to finish the last of the notes.  Her precise backhand script lay between wide margins, the paper was as smooth as pressed linen, and the dark blue monogram was decorative without possessing too many curlicues.  The whole, even to the back of the envelope, on which her name was engraved--Mrs. Lewis Martinson Byrne, with her address beneath--was pleasing.  E-mail might be the way these days, but there was still nothing as satisfying to send or to receive as a well-written letter; also these days, "Ms."  might be the title of choice for many, but Annette still preferred to be "Mrs.," and that was that. Having sealed the envelope, she placed it on top of the tidy pile of blue-and-whites, sighed, "There--that's finished," and stood up to stretch.  At eighty-five, even though your doctor said that you were physically ten years younger, you could expect to feel stiff after sitting so long.  Actually, you could expect almost anything, she thought, knowing how to laugh at herself. Old people were amusing to the young.  Once when she was less than ten years old, her mother had taken her to call on a woman who lived down the country road.  It seemed, as most things did now, like yesterday. "She's very old, at least ninety, Annette.  She was a married woman with children when Lincoln was president."   That had meant nothing to Annette. "My nephew took me out in his machine," the old woman had said.  "We went all the way without a horse."  Marveling, she had repeated, "Without a horse."   That had seemed ridiculous to Annette. "So now it's my turn," she said aloud.  "And yet, inside, I don't feel any different from the way I felt when I was twenty."  She laughed again.  "I only look different."   There she was between the windows, framed in gilt, eternally blond and thirty years old, in a red velvet dress.  Lewis had wanted to display her prominently in the living room, rather than here in the more private library.  But she had objected: portraits were intimate things, not to be shown off before the world. Facing her and framed in matching gilt on the opposite wall was Lewis himself, wearing the same expression he had worn in life, alert, friendly, and faintly curious.  Often, when she was alone here, she spoke to him. "Lewis, you would have been amused ...

Produktdetails

• Autoren: Belva Plain
• Verlag: Dell Publishing Inc.
• Sprache: Englisch
• Produktform: Taschenbuch
• Erschienen: 13.10.1998
• EAN: 9780440225270
• ISBN: 978-0-440-22527-0
• Seiten: 249
• Abmessung: 105 mm x 174 mm x 16 mm
• Thema: Belletristik > Erzählende Literatur