For as long as she can remember, Allie Massey, a gifted physical therapist, has dreamed of making her grandparents' ten-acre estate in the middle of the city into a trauma recovery center using equine therapy, a dream her grandmother, Nana Dale, embraced wholeheartedly with her financial support. But when her grandmother's will is read, the money left to Allie and her family is barely enough to cover the cost of hiring a lawyer, and worse yet, the property has been sold to a contractor.
With just three weeks until the house and barn will be imploded, a backhoe unearths one of Dale Butler's best-kept secrets and perhaps a clue to keep Allie's dream alive. As Allie cleans out her grandmother's home and searches for the missing chest, convinced there is money somewhere, she uncovers bits and pieces of her grandmother's past with her champion filly, Essie, a young man named Tommy, and one fateful night in 1943 during the Battle of the Atlantic.
"It will never be enough until you decide that you already have it all. You settle in your mind a grateful heart, a content spirit, and everything else will be gravy, girl."
Elizabeth Musser has a beautiful and lyrical style of writing that draws you in completely into her world. She invites you to settle in to her characters' lives and become fully immersed in their experiences - the joys, the sorrows, the heartbreaks. The first person storyline narrated by Allie in 2020 is cohesively entwined with third person narrative of Allie's grandmother Dale spanning the 1930s and 1940s. Allie and Dale are quite similar in their passionate, driven personalities but Dale had seen much loss and grief, as well as triumph and purpose, that Allie just starts to discover when she attempts to organize her grandmother's estate after her passing. I loved Austin, the steadfast dependable one, from the present and Tommy, the adventurous daredevil, from the past and how easy it was to get to know them though the eyes of the women who love them.
I learned quite a bit about horses, equine therapy, horseshows, and large animal vet work through the characters and the setting. Faith thread is strong and themes of true contentment and healing are powerful and moving.
Poignant, nostalgic, and thought-provoking, this newest book by Elizabeth Musser is a must-read of 2022. I received the book from the publisher and was under no obligation to post a positive comment. All opinions are my own.
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