More than a decade ago, it started. A curiosity at first, about snippets of memories that floated in and out of our business conversations. Then one day, completely by surprise, those stories shared by a mysterious yet trusted friend invited a question:
What if?
What if I could create characters to share these stories? What if others could see what I see in the fascinating things I hear? What if the ending was the way I believed it could be?
Welcome to the Finding Maria series.
These novels are fiction based on a true story that takes you through the eyes of a boy to every place imaginable in the search for love: his mother’s kitchen in Wisconsin, monastic life in Nova Scotia, military service in Vietnam, and married life back in his chosen home by the sea.
“I don’t think this is a good idea.”
We first meet Jack Brandugan as the been-there, ready-to-retire corporate executive, with his future neatly controlled as if it were an account for a client. Then his marketing team assigns him a ghostwriter and as their worlds collide, words and memories swirl and align showing not the sunset of life as he had predicted, but a path long forgotten …
“You wouldn’t know magic if it jumped out of a hat and mistook your crown jewels for a carrot.”
Gwen Paige is quiet and evasive on details of self, but direct and fearless with details of work, Jack Brandugan and his column included. After only one meeting, it is clear to Jack that this writer has more than a general comprehension of his corporate message: she has a clarity of vision that illuminates long-darkened windows into his being and the courage to challenge him, seemingly without a thought to her abilities or their effect. What is not clear to Jack is how or why she does this; what is intriguingly bothersome to him is why he cares.
So, Jack does as he always has done: allow curiosity and faith to guide him along a journey he was convinced had ended years before, fuelled by memories slowly unearthed, carefully dusted, and deftly assembled by the power of the printed word.
“And so, it seems, we write.”
And the discoveries keep on coming …
Watch for Book Five in the series:
Tentative release: Autumn 2024 but who knows? It may be earlier, and there may be sneak peeks …
Visit our Bookstore to browse Books 1 through 4 in both print and Kindle
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Check back soon for pages of discussion questions, theme nights, wine pairings and more.
From Our Blog
View From the Depths: A Mermaid’s Ode To A Book Club
We are warmly welcomed into a room lined with books – on shelves, tucked under the coffee table, footing the window seat, surrounded by a view of water glinting defiantly under clouds leaden with the last of a rare summer rain. High on an island hilltop, it was a space by and for book lovers but at first glance no place for a mermaid.
Yet they have invited me here as part of a distinguished tradition to talk about Orchids for Billie and the little boy I created. In spontaneous acknowledgement of the unique story behind the story, they have widened their invitation to include the man whose life inspired the Finding Maria series, the real ‘little Jack,’ to speak to the experience of having one’s memories and experience crafted into a story and shared with the world. Even more rare than this day of rain during our dry summer is the opportunity for the two of us to speak together on this story we created. For more than a decade we have worked, explored and collaborated as a team, yet usually in the privacy of a one-on-one meeting or solitary reflection and response. This was a test: could I let go of my creation enough to let the person speak for himself? Would I hold my own in conversation or revert to detached observer and slip off into the depths? Would this public airing of our unseen connection be appreciated or painful?