Story Description:
Baker Publishing
Group|October 1, 2012|Trade Paperback|ISBN: 978-0-7642-0788-4
A compelling
pioneer story from bestselling author Kim Vogel Sawyer.
Fed up with the
poor quality of life in 1880 New York, Tarsie Raines encourages her friends
Joss and Mary Brubacher to move with their two children to Drayton Valley,
Kansas, a booming town hailed in the guidebook as the land of opportunity. She offers to help with expenses and to care
for Mary and the children as they travel west by wagon train. But when tragedy strikes on the trip across
the prairie, Tarsie is thrown into an arrangement with Joss that leaves both of
them questioning God and their dreams for the future. As their funds dwindle and nothing goes as
planned, will Tarsie and Joss give up and go their separate ways, or will God
use their time in Drayton Valley to turn their hearts toward him?
My Review:
Twenty-four-year-old
Tarsie Raines met her friend Mary Brubacher a year ago and had been best friends
ever since. Mary was a sickly woman with
bad lungs and the air in New York City didn’t help her condition nor did the
fact her husband, Joss, insisted on having the bedroom window open at
night. Tarsie always carried her Aunts
medicinal pouch with her and on this morning it was needed. When Tarsie entered Mary’s apartment the
children were playing on their own as Mary was in bed with another fever. Tarsie prayed that God would see fit to have
Mary move out of New York. As a matter
of fact, Tarsie had found a tattered copy of James Redpath’s Handbook of Kansas
in an alley a week ago. She hoped to
convince Joss to move Mary there.
Tarsie pulled the
handbook out and showed it to Mary and began to read aloud a section: “Drayton
Valley…has the best rock-bound landing and is the best town site on the
Missouri River.” With Joss’s experience
working at the docks he’d have no problem finding work there, the air would be
fresh and clean for Mary and the two children, Emmy and Nathaniel. Moving to Kansas might also deter Joss from
wasting so much of his wages in New York’s saloons and on gambling.
Joss was in deep
debt from gambling and didn’t have the money to repay. He thought hard about Mary’s desire to move
to Kansas and thought that would be a good way to escape having to repay his
debt. He told Mary to start packing and
be ready to leave Monday. Mary refused
to leave New York without her best friend, Tarsie so she was going to Kansas
with them.
Soon they were on
their way boarding a train for Chicago, then three more to reach Des Moines,
Iowa where they’d join in a wagon train to Kansas. After finding a wagon at a livery, the
Brubacher’s and Tarsie set out on the last leg of their journey. Then tragedy strikes and forces Joss and
Tarsie into a situation that neither is comfortable with but for the sake of
the children they haven’t much choice.
Will they ever reach Kansas? Will
Tarsie and Joss even stay together?
A Home in Drayton Valley is a satisfying
page-turner that I just couldn’t put down.
It kept me reading long into the night.
"Book has been provided courtesy of Baker Publishing Group and Graf-Martin Communications, Inc.
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