A Letter from Danielle for June ’21
Hello Everyone,
Ahhh, it’s finally spring—and almost summer! Memorial Day weekend unofficially opens the summer season. After a cold winter, I am ready for some good weather, and warmer days. June is full of the anticipation of summer. I know we’re all ready to see the last of the pandemic so we can get back to “normal times” again and enjoy family and friends this summer (even if we still have to wear masks at the appropriate times).
June is usually a month of graduations, most of which still seem to be virtual. And the weddings that were postponed for the last year and a half are being scheduled again in many parts of the country and the world. It looks like travel will be possible to some places and we can actually make summer plans. In Paris, restaurants with terraces will finally reopen for outdoor dining, which will make Paris look and feel like Paris again. Lots of great people-watching from a table at an outdoor cafe!! I’ve missed restaurants a lot, and the opportunity to dine with friends. Restaurants in Paris have been closed for 9 months. So the world around us is coming alive again. . . .
And with summer, hopefully you’ll be able to find time to relax and take some time off—and do some reading! My latest book, Finding Ashley, is recently out, if you haven’t had the chance to read it yet. I hope you’ll love the story. It’s about mothers and daughters and sisters (a theme I love), and the search for the baby one woman gave up for adoption when she was fifteen—and has never been able to locate as an adult. It’s also about the relationship between sisters who, even when they have drifted apart for a long time and events bring them back together, discover that their bond to each other is still strong. It’s about one of the subjects I love to write about: human relationships, and the strength, resilience, and perseverance of the human spirit even in adversity—and our ability to recover from life’s blows.
My new paperback, Daddy’s Girls, came out a week ago, and is a powerful book—also about sisters and the unique relationship each of them has with their father, and how differently they each see him, as sinner or saint, hero or tyrant. After their father’s sudden, unexpected death, three sisters discover their father’s long-hidden secrets and struggle to make their peace with what they find out and the man they knew. It’s about the relationship he had with each of them and how they dealt with it: the daughter who worked so hard to win his praise and was always overlooked and undervalued, the daughter who was never understood and fled, and the daughter whom he openly said was his favorite. And how each of those relationships affected their lives. Once he’s gone, they strive for healing and become closer to each other than ever before. And it all takes place on a splendid ranch in the Santa Ynez Valley in California, the place of their childhood memories, joys, and disappointments—which becomes their haven now.
I’m working on new books, which will be coming soon! In the meantime, I hope your summer is off to a great start, and it summer will make up for the challenges of the last year and a half. Have a terrific month of June!!!
Love,
Danielle