A Blessed Event

Download or read book A Blessed Event written by Jean Reynolds Page and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How much is too much to ask of friendship? How long will the bonds of family endure when confronted with swift, unexpected change? These are the intimate questions Jean Reynolds Page poses in A Blessed Event, her assured and powerful literary debut. Joanne Timbro and Darla Stevens have grown up in a small Texas town, their childhood homes separated only by adjoining back yards. Although the families inside these houses have little in common, the two girls find in each other a rare friendship that will take them into their adult lives; a friendship that makes them stronger together than either could be alone. Then as young women, Darla and Jo enter into an agreement that will startle everyone who cares for them. After years of watching Darla’s heartbreaking failure to have a baby with her husband, Cal, Joanne agrees to give birth to the child that Darla cannot have on her own. But in the early morning hours of a warm July morning, everything changes. Joanne, then four months pregnant, is driving a car that veers off the road near the home that Darla shares with Cal. In the days and months that follow, Darla must face for the first time in her memory, the possibility of life without Jo. As Darla tries to uncover the secrets that brought her friend out onto the highway in those dark morning hours, she discovers that she must also fight to keep the baby that was intended to be her child. With the child’s fate hanging in the balance, Darla searches for clues to Jo’s strange behavior leading up to the crash. In the process, she discovers truths that hide in her own life: in her marriage, in her closest friendships, and in a past that has suddenly reemerged, full of unfolding secrets. Tender and heartbreaking, hopeful and honest, A Blessed Event brings life’s everyday experiences into bright focus, contrasting beautifully the pain of suffering with the sublime joys of surviving—and truly living.

Download or read book Blessed Events written by Pamela E. Klassen and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2021-06-08 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Blessed Events explores how women who give birth at home use religion to make sense of their births and in turn draw on their birthing experiences to bring meaning to their lives and families. Pamela Klassen introduces a surprisingly diverse group of women, in their own words, while also setting their birth stories within wider social, political, and economic contexts. In doing so, she emerges with a study that disrupts conventional views of both childbirth and religion by blurring assumed divisions between conservative and feminist women and by taking childbirth seriously as a religious act. Most American women who have a choice give birth in a hospital and request pain medication. Yet enough women choose and advocate unmedicated home birth--and do so for carefully articulated reasons, social resistance among them--to constitute a movement. Klassen investigates why women whose religious affiliations range from Old Order Amish to Reform Judaism to goddess-centered spirituality defy majority opinion, the medical establishment, and sometimes the law to have their babies at home. In considering their interpretations--including their critiques of the dominant medical model of childbirth and their views on labor pain--she examines the kinds of agency afforded to or denied women as they derive religious meanings from childbirth. Throughout, she identifies tensions and affinities between feminist and traditionalist appraisals of the symbolic meaning of birth and the power of women. What does home birth--a woman-centered movement working to return birth to women's control--mean in practice for women's gender and religious identities? Is this supreme valuing of procreation and motherhood constraining, or does it open up new realms of cultural and social power for women? By asking these questions while remaining cognizant of religion's significance, Blessed Events challenges both feminist and traditionalist accounts of childbearing while broadening our understanding of how religion is ''lived'' in contemporary America.

Download or read book THE RANCHER'S BLESSED EVENT written by Stella Bagwell and published by Harlequin. This book was released on 2011-07-15 with total page 153 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: twins on the doorstep WITH BABY ON THE WAY… The very sight of Cooper Dunn still made Emily's pulse race, but the last thing she wanted was to let him back into her life…or her heart. What Emily needed was a man who would stay, a man who would love her more than the next rodeo…a man who'd love the baby she was carrying. Cooper made no promises—he'd help get the family ranch in working order and then he'd move on. But spending time with Emily awoke long-buried feelings—and made him yearn for a family. And then the baby came…. STELLA Bagwell The next generation of Murdocks continues the adventure of love!

Download or read book Blessed Events written by Debra Evans and published by . This book was released on 1990 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Event written by David L. Golemon and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2010-04-01 with total page 514 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A secret agency must solve the riddles of history to battle an apocalyptic alien threat in this supernatural thriller series debut. In the summer of 1947, an unidentified object crashed in Roswell, New Mexico. There were no survivors. Now it’s happened again. But this time, two creatures have emerged from the wreckage. One is a small, benevolent being, brimming with intelligence. The other is an animal of remarkable strength, brought to Earth to annihilate all life on the planet. It is called the Destroyer of Worlds. In the desert wastelands of the American Southwest, a battle is about to commence as the two creatures set out to fulfill their own destinies among the human race. Only the Event Group, the US government’s most secret agency, is prepared to stop the devastation. Now they must uncover the hidden truths of ancient myths and legends to ensure that history’s errors will never be repeated. Led by the valiant Major Jack Collins, the Event Group wages total war in the desert. Using the benevolent creature as an ally and resource, they combine forces with the US military and prepare themselves for an epic battle against the most dangerous threat humanity has ever faced.

Download or read book Creating Your Life as a Blessing written by Carol Joy Goldstein-Hall and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2003-08-11 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Do you remember when there were new worlds to discover and creativity meant adventure? Recapture those wonderful feelings with the inspirational stories and poems from Creating Your Life as a Blessing. The stories include Do Dead Ends Stop You?, Joyful at 98, Childhood Wounds Still Hurt, FallingBut Not in Love, The Healing Power of Music, Living Your Life as a Blessing and Learning Faith. Each story is followed by a lesson and thought-provoking questions to answer. If you are ready to deepen your spiritual life, increase your joy, and experience more of lifes blessings, this book is for you.

Download or read book The Bad Luck Wedding Cake written by Emily March and published by Emily March Books. This book was released on 2017-10-12 with total page 421 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Claire Donovan is dead-set against marriage... For generations, a secret formula called "Magic" has made the Donovan bakery wares strangely irresistible...until independent daughter Claire jilts the fiancé her family chose for her and everything changes. Now her broken engagement has branded their cakes bad luck and the business will go bankrupt unless she ties the knot... Tye McBride would rather die than say "I do." The most eligible bachelor in town, sexy Tye McBride steers clear of marriage-hungry females. Once betrayed by love, he's vowed never to fall for a woman's lies again. Besides, he has his hands full minding his mischievous nieces—the McBride Menaces. But when his lawyer tells him to either marry or lose guardianship, he sees the beautiful baker as the perfect bride—in name only. Except something about her makes him dizzy with desire. Something about him makes her breathless. Something could complicate their best-laid plans. Something like...magic. It's their bad luck that sometimes, convenience isn't very convenient.