Books and Banter: Patricia Yager Delagrange ~ guest post and her novel Passing Through Brandiss

TITLE: Passing Through Brandiss

RELEASE DATE: May 20, 2016

AUTHOR: Patricia Yager Delagrange

PAGE COUNT: 338

ISBN: 978-1530377138

IMPRINT: Sly Fox

BOOK PAGE: http://ravenswoodpublishing.com/bookpages/passingthroughbrandiss.html

KEYWORDS: single mother, romance, small town, adoption, missing family members, Santa Barbara, California, Alameda, California

CATEGORIES: Romance/Women’s Fiction/Contemporary

ONE LINER: After losing her husband, Annie and her son move to Brandiss where her life changes when she meets a pregnant teenager and a handsome contractor.

SYNOPSIS:

After the tragic loss of her husband, Annie and her young son search for a new life full of meaning and hope. Fate nudges Annie into the arms of a man whose wife disappeared with his child years ago. Annie’s life spins out of control when first the pregnant teenager she hires to help her with her garden asks Annie to adopt her baby and shortly afterwards the long-lost wife of the man Annie loves reappears. Riddled with grief and heartache, the experiences demonstrate how, even in the face of overwhelming sorrow, opening her heart and home to those most in need of love has reaped unexpected joy for Annie and her son.

Guest Post - How I Came Up With The Idea For Passing Through Brandiss.

There are several reasons I chose to write this book. I’m a married mom with two children and it’s the hardest job I’ve ever had. So I’ve always wondered what it would be like to be a single mom and have 100% responsibility for raising a child with no help from anyone. I have a husband who can help me out when it’s necessary. What if I didn’t? It can be scary to be the one who has to make all the decisions for another person’s life, whether day-to-day decisions or life-altering ones. It’s hard. What if I was in that position?

I’ve often thought what it would feel like to pack up and hit the road and look for another place to live. When I was a teenager, I looked forward to getting my driver’s license so I could drive anywhere I wanted. I felt so free when I’d go on long drives with no planned destination. I’d jump in my VW Kharmann Ghia and just “go”. In doing so, I saw different parts of cities and towns that I wouldn’t normally experience. At the time I was single with no ties to anyone. Even though Annie has a son, she finds she’s in a similar situation. Her parents have passed on and she can do whatever she wants, keeping in mind she has a young son. But in reality, she’s the one to make the decisions for both of them and she can do whatever she wants.

Annie didn’t ask to be a single mom. It wasn’t something she planned. And it certainly wasn’t something she ever wanted. But, after finding herself in that position, she has to make choices that will be best for both her and for her son Rafe. How would I feel if I was surrounded with memories tied to the home I lived in as well as the city where I resided? Wouldn’t it be hard to forge ahead and act like everything was normal if the most important person in your life was no longer around to share with? I wanted to explore those questions so I created Annie and Rafe.

However the most important reason I wrote this book is because I never dreamed I would adopt a child. But I did. I gave birth to my son Dylan and several years later when we wanted a second child, I discovered I was already peri-menopausal. My husband and I had no experience with adoption but I had a work-friend who had adopted all of his three children. I got in touch with him and he gave me the name of his attorney. We originally wanted a closed adoption, thinking we wouldn’t want to know the birth parents. However, the attorney only dealt with open adoptions. After explaining an open adoption to us, my husband and I agreed that it sounded like a good idea. We would set the parameters for how much, if any, interaction there would be between our adopted daughter and the birth parents, but the child would always be “ours”. Six months later we picked up our daughter when she was less than 24 hours old. We still are in contact with the birth parents who live about three hours from our home. I wanted to write about the experience of adopting a child, hence Passing Through Brandiss.

AUTHOR BIO:

Born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, Patricia attended St. Mary’s College, studied her junior year at the University of Madrid, received a B.A. in Spanish at UC Santa Barbara then went on to get a Master’s degree in Education at Oregon State University. She lives with her husband and two teenage children in Alameda, across the bay from San Francisco, along with two very large chocolate labs, Annabella and Jack. Her Friesian horse Maximus lives in the Oakland hills in a stall with a million dollar view.

AUTHOR LINKS:

http://www.patriciayagerdelagrange.com
http://www.patriciayagerdelagrange.com
https://twitter.com/PattiYager
https://www.facebook.com/patricia.delagrange

BUY LINKS: