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In an attempt to escape from her stressful life as a single working mother of two young boys, Kathy Giuffre books a year-long trip for four in a tropical paradise. At the last minute, her boyfriend announces he isn't joining them, and Kathy finds herself in an unlivable house in Rarotonga, a tiny speck in the middle of the South Pacific Ocean. Her unlikely savior is Emily, an 82-year-old Maori woman with a large white house on the edge of the ocean, which the two women share with two callous missionaries, the ghosts of Emily's ancestors, and, briefly, a bizarre couple from Eastern Europe. As time passes, Kathy is seduced by the island and its people and by feelings she has never before experienced. This is an inspirational story about having the courage to search for something better and finding it--serenity, sensuality, and, ultimately, love.
About the author
Kathy Giuffre was born and raised in Arkansas, and received a BA from Harvard University and a PhD from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is a professor of sociology at Colorado College, a specialist in the study of social networks in the art world, and the author of Collective Creativity: Art and Society in the South Pacific. Her research on Pacific artists led to her spending a year living on Rarotonga in the Cook Islands group. Today she lives in Colorado Springs with her husband and two sons.
