The Parting Gift by Leah Sanders and Rachel Van Dyken

Story: 10
Presentation: 10
Total: 20
Publisher: Astraea Press
Inspirational Romance
To Purchase

Blurb: Blaine Graham lost his mother at the tender age of eleven. Grief over the loss drove a wedge between him and his father, and soon proved too difficult for him to deal with. At the age of sixteen, he falsified his papers and made the trip across the border into Canada with his best friend to join the Royal Canadian Air Force and enter the war in Europe as a pilot. Ten years later Captain Graham finds himself flying commercial jets in Boston – his estranged father and his past life all but forgotten, until the day he receives a telegram from his dying father asking him to come home.

The persistent Mara Crawford, a live-in nurse, has experienced her fair share of loss as well. Her attachment to Blaine’s father drives her desire to bring reconciliation between the two men before time runs out for her patient. But her best laid plans didn’t include falling in love again.

Review: Amazing! I do not know if this review will give appropriate justice to not only the storyline but the presentation. The Parting Gift is a story of heartfelt emotion. The emotion is not subject to one area but it covers all areas from joy, love, laughter, new found discoveries to loss and heartache. Leah Sanders has done more than an excellent job of bringing out the emotions of human beings in the purest of forms.

The story begins with the funeral of Emily Graham, wife to David Graham and mother to eleven year old Blaine Graham. The life of Emily Graham was so precious to the two that neither knew how to deal with her death. The loss caused tension, regret, hate, anger and rebellion to build in the home, which once harbored love and laughter. After nearly 5 years had passed Blaine left home in a rage at his father and never looked back. Never wanting to see his father again. David Graham's bitterness and anger over his son's departure grew and grew until it consumed him to his very core. It was not until he was diagnosed with a illness that was threatening to end his life soon that he would be brought to feelings of forgiveness and want of reconciliation with his son. David Graham's feelings of forgiveness and reconciliation did not come on their own but with the help of his nurse, Mara, he learned to adapt these feelings as his own.

 

Blaine living his own life, was jolted to a point of unearthed reality when he received the telegram from Mara informing him of his father's failing health and inevitable death only months away. Tossed about with confusing emotions from the telegram and memories from years before he reluctantly makes his way back home.

 

The memories of his mother hit him as he entered the home he had tried to forget for so many years. The failing health of his father was a sight that was so foreign to him he had no idea how to deal with such an image. Through the help of Mara, the beautiful nurse, taking care of his father and his father's willingness to forgive and accept Blaine found himself on his knees in new discovery of a world he thought had been buried long ago. Blaine's journey back home opened doors of forgiveness, love and a new found meaning for life he never knew could exist anymore.

 

The message of love, hope, forgiveness and heartache are all presented in the dearest of forms by Leah Sanders. This story had me in tears, hope and happiness on more than one occasion. The Parting Gift is one you must add to your collection of must reads. You will surely not be disappointed.