TANGLED LIVES - Carol McClain - One Free Book

Welcome back to my blog. Why did you become an author? I taught English for many years. My favorite subject was my AP English Language and Composition. Here we studied syntax and diction and elements that made writing memorable. Coupled with my regular classes with students who always wrote, I wondered—could I write a book?

Obviously, I did.

That said, you’ll never read my first writings—Praise God.

As I reflect, I always had been a dreamer and in the dreaming, a writer. I started in third grade, paused in my authorial skills until the horrible, angst-filled poetry stage in high school. I moved on to Sunday school plays until the day I asked myself that fateful question: Could I write a book?

If you weren’t an author, what would be your dream job? I already had my dream job and am still living it. Teaching.

I always joked I lacked imagination. As a child, my parents thought school was necessary. At play at home, I acted out classroom scenes with me as the teacher. After college, I couldn’t think of anything else I wanted to do, so I “did” school.

I’ve retired from the classroom, but I supervise student teachers and teach Bible studies.

I love school.

If you could have lived at another time in history, what would it be and why?

I’m not so sure I’d change. If I lived in the 1700 or 1800s, I’d be dead from a hemorage after childbirth, or from the cancer I had in my thirties or my ruptured appendix. Earlier in the 20^th century we had World War I and World War II. Any earlier epoch was probably worse: bubonic plague, serfdom, sweating sickness, slavery.

Our society is on the wrong path today and is mentioned daily in my prayers, but I’ve been fortunate to have been born when higher education didn’t mortgage your life and all our mores didn’t sell our souls.

What place in the United States have you not visited that you would like to? Alaska! My husband and I have watched every show about Alaska. The state is gorgeous. To see glaciers and the Alaska Range and Denali and the tundra would be a dream come true.

My protagonist in Tangled Lives dreams of Alaska and mimics my longing (except for the cold, and my love for the Smokies).

The bugs, rain, darkness, and -50F temps would keep me from living there, but I’d love to see the state—the whole state.

How about a foreign country you hope to visit? I’ve been fortunate to see much of Europe. Spain and Italy are my favorites. I’d go to either of those countries again and again. I love art and architecture, and these two countries abound in both.

What lesson has the Lord taught you recently?

“Hang on.”

“Pain produces beauty if you allow the Lord to work.”

Recently, I had a spate of hard situations. After a year of decline and suffering, my mother died. A couple of months later, I had a ruptured appendix which I think was worse than any doctor told me as I lay in the hospital on heavy pain medication for five days.

During that time, my dear brother died suddenly. My daughter had elective surgery. Then her father died.

I knew people prayed for me, but I couldn’t feel God. I dug into worship and my Bible. I believed without feeling Him, that God carried me.Andrew Ripp, a contemporary Christian singer, has a line in his song “Roses” that makes me cry every time I hear the lyrics because of its beauty and truth: “Love is the blood-red stain, the beauty that the pain exposes. Maybe that’s why God made roses.”

As I exit this stage of my life, I cherish this “Blood-red stain.”

Tell us about the featured book? Tangled Lives is a contemporary novel. Two sisters love the same man. They share a past one can’t remember and the other can’t forget.

Tangled Lives is the third, and final installment, of the Treasure Lives series. The story follows the life of Roxie and Crystal Snow, two of the sisters found by Meredith Jaynes in Book 1, Borrowed Lives. The past tangles their future as they learn forgiveness and decide to follow their dreams rather than their prescribed lives.

Please give us the first page of the book.

Prologue

Childhood behaves like the morning mist. Children dance and delight, then grow and vanish into the light of their days. So many nights, I wished my girls would mature, would give me grandchildren, would give me a moment to myself. First, of course, go to college.

When the time arrived, and they left me, they took their magic. Without magic, the scent of childhood wafted away in the morning fog. How could I have understood, all those years ago, the bedraggled waifs I fostered would steal my heart? In my reluctance to mother the abandoned children, I never fathomed the temporary fostering would turn into everlasting love when I adopted them.

Once more, I bit back tears as Crystal Joy, my youngest girl, climbed into her car. Last week, we outfitted the Honda with hand controls, so she could drive despite her spina bifida. Parker and I watched as she drove away to the University of Tennessee to join her sister.

I imagined I heard her singing. Never was Crystal without a song even as a child. Back then she hammered on pots and Tupperware to make music. Her alto, always on pitch. Her fingers twitched on guitar strings or dulcimers. In the end, my youngest daughter settled on the violin. Never did the spina bifida slow Crystal down or make her feel inferior. Could a mother call one child perfect?

The dust from the road settled, and I stood next to Parker like the day Lisa Simpson tried to adopt Crystal’s sister.

Roxie.

Always the most sensitive. Perhaps the proverbial middle child. Sweet, insecure Roxie. Too independent and too needy. Her biological parents died of drug overdoses. Roxie had been old enough to understand abandonment, too young to realize her parents’ issues had nothing to do with her worth. Her oldest sister’s grandfather adopted her when she was eight. The hole bored through my heart. It compounded sweet Roxie’s belief in her lack of worth. Roxie believed I loved everyone more than her.

Parker looped his arm around me.

His closeness soothed. Always.

“Meredith, the girls will be home before you realize they moved out. Now’s the time for them to heal, live their passions, and find themselves.” He kissed the top of my head. “They’ll be okay.”

In Parker’s eyes, I hoped to see the truth of his words. This time, I didn’t run away and hide. I let God take my fears and prayed the sins of my daughters’ parents would no longer descend on their innocent offspring. I prayed the love of adoptive parents and a heavenly Father would redeem.

Here are my buy links:

Tangled Lives print book: https://www.amazon.com/Tangled-Lives-Carol-McClain/dp/1649499671/ref

Tangled Lives ebook: https://www.amazon.com/Tangled-Lives-Treasured-Book-ebook/dp/B0CBLFJJC6/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1689345211&sr=8-1

How can readers find you on the Internet?

My website lists my appearances, my releases with buy links, and my blog. You can find me at:

http://www.carolmcclain.com

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Thank you for sharing this book with my blog readers and me. I love your unique writing voice.

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