All That Is Hidden

By Laura DeNooyer

Description:

Are secrets worth the price they cost to keep?

Ten-year-old Tina Hamilton finds out the hard way.

She always knew her father had a secret. But all of God’s earth to Tina are the streams for fishing, the fields for romping, a world snugly enclosed by the blue-misted Smokies. Nothing ever changed.

Until the summer of 1968. Trouble erupts when northern exploitation threatens her tiny southern Appalachian town.

Some folks blame the trouble on progress, some blame the space race and men meddling with the moon’s cycles, and some blame Tina’s father.

A past he has hidden catches up to him as his secret settles in like an unwelcome guest. The clash of progressive ideas and small town values escalates the collision of a father’s past and present.

Tina struggles with her shaken confidence in a father who, in hiding his past, has made a string of choices that shape her childhood. Gradually, Tina gains insight into her father through seemingly unrelated circumstances: her feud with a fellow ballplayer, her friendship with Old Joe who lives alone on the mountain, a gift left to her father by a neighbor fourteen years dead, and a broken promise.

Meticulously researched, this moving and engaging coming-of-age tale is a delightful, richly-textured tapestry of family stories woven with the timeless wisdom of generations past, all of which guide Tina and create the fabric of a journey to forgiveness that will warm your heart.

Tina is forced to answer a difficult question: are secrets worth the price they cost to keep? Pour yourself a cup of tea, settle in, and come along. Then you decide.

Book Takeaway:

I hope readers feel immersed in southern Appalachian culture, are gripped by the complex dilemmas, and see how family ties, love, and forgiveness reach across barriers. Besides the cornbread, grits, and pork stew, there’s plenty of food for thought and discussion.

Why the author wrote this book:

A visit to western North Carolina gave me the opportunity to meet people who created meaningful lives by a route much different from those seeking the prosperity of “The American Dream” I’d grown up with. Even with humble surroundings, meager possessions, and simple goals, these people enjoyed rich lives, and missed out on nothing.