The Twelfth Child by Bette Lee Cosby : Guest Post, Excerpt

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Literary/Southern Women’s Fiction

Title: THE TWELFTH CHILD

Author: Bette Lee Crosby

Date Published: May 2012

Be prepared to be swept away into the life of a girl who will tug at your emotions while never leaving your heart. Crosby has crafted a story that will enchant readers.

Steena Holmes, bestselling author of Finding Emma

Trust, love and friendship—Abigail Anne Lannigan searched for these things all her life. Now, when she is at the tail end of her years, she teams up with a free-spirited young woman. A nobody from nowhere, who suddenly moves in across the street. This unlikely friendship comes under suspicion when a million dollars goes missing and a distant relative, claims embezzlement. Abigail knows the truth of what happened, but she’ll never get the chance to tell..

Reminiscent of Fannie Flagg’s Fried Green Tomatoes, the unlikely friendship of these two women is sure to settle in the soft spot of your heart.

Strong Female Characters without the “I am woman hear me roar” mentality. Crosby writes in a way that puts readers within the story so that they can visualize themselves experiencing the hurts and joys of the protagonist. A Book and A Review

I rarely give 5 stars for a book, but this book definitely deserves 5 stars! Crosby deals with timely issues such as caring for the elderly, greed, forgiveness, isolation, love, selfishness, and selflessness. If you like novels about strong women and relationships, you would probably enjoy this book. I have already lined up my next Bette Lee Crosby novel. Amazon Review

Bette Lee Crosby is a storyteller extraordinaire. She has honed her craft, and shares it in this well told novel. McGuffy’s Reader - Blogspot

A deeply moving story that touches the core of your heart…Layered Pages

Characters with an emotional depth that compels the reader to care about their challenges, to root for their success and to appreciate their bravery. Goodreads Review.

 

Amazon

The Shenandoah Valley 

1912 

In the spring of 1912, Livonia Lannigan’s body grew round and firm. Her breasts became heavy and her stomach swelled to a great size. She took to leaving the waistband buttons of her dresses unhooked but even so could barely fit into the clothes she had worn just one year ago. The cotton bodices pressed tight against her tender breasts and she worried that it might stifle the milk flow needed for the baby so she loosened them whenever she was alone. Last summer her ankles and feet had not swollen, now they throbbed and were thick and heavy as ham hocks. All of these discomforts were of no concern to Livonia as she was thankful for the size of her stomach, surely an indication that this baby was growing robust and healthy. When walking became painful she sat on the front porch, rocking back and forth so slowly that at times she appeared motionless.  For hours on end she would remain that way, waiting to feel movement from the baby that would come in September. Every night she crouched down with her knees pressing against the hardwood floor and her hands folded across the rise of her stomach. “Please God,” she would pray, “help me to deliver a healthy son for William.”

 

Her first baby boy had died before he was christened or even named. The birth came two months early, on the second Wednesday in August—a day when William rode off to the Lexington Market long before the cock crowed. Livonia blamed no one but herself, for it was she who felt such a burning hunger for the cool breezes of the Rappahannock River. It had been a brutal summer—almost no rain, the earth so dry that gritty dust rose from nothing more than the flutter of a bird’s wing, and a dark red sand settled into Livonia’s pores and stripped her hair of its luster. On that fateful day, her only intent was to cool herself; to sit beneath a shady oak tree and perhaps dangle her feet into the edge of the water. She saddled Whisper, a mare named for her gentleness, and rode out beyond the meadow. The animal moved along at an easy canter, slowing when she came to a dry stream bed or overgrown thicket, seemingly aware of the precious cargo she carried. No one could have known that a flock of wild turkeys would tear across the pathway and startle the poor mare so that without warning she’d rear up and throw the rider. Late that afternoon the animal returned home with an empty saddle; she stood there alongside the barn and waited. 

 

William did not return from Lexington until almost nightfall. The much needed rain had started that afternoon and on three different occasions he was forced to climb from the wagon and walk the skittish horse through a flooded gully in the road. He was wet and weary when he arrived home and it angered him that Livonia had not lit a lamp in the window. He did not see the still-saddled mare until he pulled close by the barn. As he guided both animals into the barn, he wondered if Livonia would have been foolish enough to go riding in this weather; and a sense of dread settled over him as he hurried to the house calling out for his wife. 

 

When William heard nothing but the sound of his own voice echoing back from the mountains, he took a lantern in his hand, folded an extra blanket beneath the mare’s saddle, and started across the meadow in search of his wife. The rain had washed away any trail she might have left, so William had to rely solely upon his understanding of Livonia’s nature to figure out which way she had traveled. He rode for three hours, calling her name out as he went, “Livonia, Livonia.” He finally came upon her lying in the mud of the narrow pathway and nearly unconscious; a bloody baby was locked in her arms. The baby’s eyes were closed and its tiny fingers curled into fists. When William lifted the dead baby and saw it was a boy, he let out a wail so mournful that folks say it echoed up and down Massanutten Ridge for days afterward.

 

William Lannigan was a man who worked from sunup ‘till sundown. He plowed and planted, harvested the crops and whatever produce he didn’t use to feed his family, he carted off to market in the back of a horse drawn wagon. He single-handedly loaded his bushel baskets of apples onto the wagon and traveled twenty-three miles back and forth to the Lexington Market. Even in the drought years when many Shenandoah Valley farmers abandoned the fruitless land, he stayed, worked the farm, and eked out a living for his family. When the orchards failed, he planted corn and beans and tomatoes. His father before him had done the same, only his father had three stropping sons to help with the labor. William, being the eldest, had inherited the farm. A farm he would one day pass down to his own eldest son. But last November William turned fifty-six; he was feeling the weight of a man who had fathered seven girl babies and two boys, three if you include the dead child of his fourth wife Livonia. Not one of his boys had lived to see five years of age. William had already made his decision—if Livonia failed to produce a healthy baby boy this time, he would burn the crops and let the land lay fallow for all eternity. 

 

In the last week of August, when the temperature in the valley was at an all time high, Livonia noticed a red stain on her panties and flew into a panic. Not again, she thought. It was too early. She had another three or four weeks before her time. It can’t happen to this baby, not this baby she repeated over and over in her mind; all the while reminding herself how everything in the valley got dusted over with the gritty red sand that rose from the earth in the heat of summer. This time, she had done nothing to cause a miscarriage; she had weeded the garden and gathered eggs early in the morning then stayed indoors when the sun was at high noon. Twice a day she had sat in the rocker and done nothing but rest. She knew this was a healthy baby; she had felt him moving. When he kicked and squirmed beneath her skin, she soothed his restlessness with the gentle stroke of her hand and a whispered lullaby. This time Livonia had done nothing wrong. Nothing. She went to the bedroom and checked her panties against the red discoloration on her white smock but it was not the same. The smock had splotches of a reddish brown color, the panties were the color of watered down pig’s blood. Livonia went to the front porch and rang the large copper bell with a firm hand. The clang echoed through the mountains, loud and clear for almost five minutes. As she waited, Livonia sat down in the rocker and prayed.

 

 

Life Lessons

 

Almost anyone who has ever read one of my novels will agree that there is a thread of lighthearted humor running throughout even the most dire situation. Why? Well, for one reason I had a Southern Mama who taught me to laugh at myself. She showed me how to step back from the agony of a lost love and see the man who broke my heart as simply someone with a wad of gum stuck to his shoe. She also taught me that it’s okay to cry, but only for so long. Once you’ve licked your wounds it’s time to get up and tackle life all over again. This is the life lesson my mother gave to me and I in turn try to pass it along to my characters.

 

In The Twelfth Child, don’t expect to read about the typical ‘I am woman hear me roar’ person. My characters are not like that. Abigail Ann Lannigan is rather like my mother. She’s funny and yet wise. She makes mistakes, bad choices, and wrong turns, but when all else fails, she reaches down inside of herself and finds a way to go on. The same is true of Destiny Fairchild. Although they are generations apart, these two women have held onto the capacity to love—each other and the men in their lives. On a New Year’s Eve that by all rights should be tragic, they head to Miami Beach where they’ll drink champagne, paint their toenails pink and talk of skinny-dipping in the Atlantic Ocean.  

 

We can’t always control the pathway that our life takes, but we can decide whether or not we’ll whistle as we walk that path. At least that’s what Mama said, and Mama’s almost always right.

 

Award-winning novelist Bette Lee Crosby brings the wit and wisdom of her Southern Mama to works of fiction—the result is a delightful blend of humor, mystery and romance along with a cast of quirky charters who will steal your heart away.

Born in Detroit and raised in a plethora of states scattered across the South and Northeast, Crosby originally studied art and began her career as a packaging designer. When asked to write a few lines of copy for the back of a pantyhose package, she discovered a love for words that was irrepressible. After years of writing for business, she turned to works of fiction and never looked back. “Storytelling is in my blood,” Crosby laughingly admits, “My mom was not a writer, but she was a captivating storyteller, so I find myself using bits and pieces of her voice in most everything I write.”

Crosby’s work was first recognized in 2006 when she received The National League of American Pen Women Award for a then unpublished manuscript. Since that, she has gone on to win several more awards, including another NLAPW award, three Royal Palm Literary Awards, the FPA President’s Book Award Gold Medal and most recently the 2011 Reviewer’s Choice Award and Reader’s View Southeast Fiction Literary Award.

Her published works to date are: Cracks in the Sidewalk (2009), Spare Change (2011), The Twelfth Child (2012), and Life in the Land of IS (2012). Life in the Land of IS is a memoir written for Lani Deauville, a woman the Guinness Book of Records lists as the world’s longest living quadriplegic.

Crosby newest novel Cupid’s Christmas is scheduled for release in early October and following that, What Matters Most will be released in early 2013.  

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