In 1968 we meet six teens confined at the Good Shepherd—a dark and secretive institution controlled by Sisters of Charity nuns—locked awaymerely for being gay, pregnant, or simply unruly.
Mairin— free-spirited daughter of Irish immigrants, committed to keep her safe from her stepfather.
Angela—denounced for her attraction to girls, sent to the nuns for reform, but instead found herself the victim of a predator.
Helen—the daughter of intellectuals detained in Communist China, she saw her “temporary” stay at the Good Shepherd stretch into years.
Odessa—caught up in a police dragnet over a racial incident, she found the physical and mental toughness to endure her sentence.
Denise—sentenced for brawling in a foster home, she dared to dream of a better life.
Janice—deeply insecure, she couldn’t decide where her loyalty lay—except when it came to her friend Kay, who would never outgrow her childlike dependency.
Sister Bernadette—rescued from a dreadful childhood, she owed her loyalty to the Sisters of Charity even as her conscience weighed on her.
I like to believe I am the person my dogs think I am.
I phone my parents every day, as they are elderly and adorable, and they read me stories every day of my freakishly normal childhood. I was a writer before I learned to read, by creating scribbles on paper and dictating the stories to my saintly mother. You can see examples here: https://plus.google.com/u/1/photos/104585203815605467940/albums/5587379107269629729?banner=pwa&partnerid=pwrd1.
Untold eons later, I still read and write everyday and I've gotten very good at it. I live in a ridiculously gorgeous place in the world--an island in Puget Sound, Washington where we have a lot of the same flowers you grow in the UK. But bigger slugs. Much bigger slugs.
I have lots more to tell you, so please join me on Facebook and check out pictures of my dogs and tell me what's on your mind. https://www.facebook.com/susanwiggs
No comments:
Post a Comment