This is a story about choices. Some easy, others most difficult to make and still others far reaching in their effects on our lives and the lives of others. It is also a story about dealing with life's surprises and tragedies. Dealing with the curves life throws at you and your ability to bounce back from adversity. Choice one: Kendra Taylor is really sick and in desperate need of the prescription waiting at the pharmacy. Her husband Isaac is, as usual, wrapped up at work and can't get her meds for her. So she braves the nasty weather and with her newly purchased drugs heads back to her car silently praying she has the strength to make it safely home. But fate steps in, in the form of an armed car jacker and his shot leaves Kendra fighting for her life.

Kendra's choice and the ensuing events will forever alter her life as well as her husband Isaac's but as we learn changes are often good for us. And change is just what Kendra and Isaac's life and marriage sorely need. We are drawn into the story of Isaac's family and discover along with Kendra some wonderful and some sad facts that help us understand the man Isaac has become. His life has been shaped by choices made by his grandmother Leah, grandfather Jesse, mother Rachel as well as his adopted parents. But the most important choice left is whether Isaac will join Kendra on her journey to learn all she can about his history and hopefully save their fragile marriage.

You're probably wondering what this has to do with a quilt as suggested by the title "Lover's Knot." Well, the quilt is one of the key participants in this adventure. Through the quilt they discover the many secrets that will unlock the past and pave the way toward Isaac's awakening of his true self. The quilt takes us on an adventure where we meet the inhabitants of Lock Hollow before all the land was taken by the government to be preserved as a national park. The stories of the inhabitants reveal the hardship caused by the systematic claiming of lands long held by generations of families who now were forced to resettle in other areas leaving behind homes and friends and facing uncertain futures.

Emilie Richards has once again pieced together a gem of a story that tugs at the heartstrings, piques your curiosity and gives the reader a peek at a time, not so long ago, where people's destinies were at times in the hands of strangers -- seemingly choice-less or perhaps it just felt like that. Kendra and Isaac's story is about making the right choices even if they seem at odds with convention. Reading LOVER'S KNOT would be a good -- no, a great choice.

Book Summary

After narrowly escaping death, newspaper journalist Kendra Taylor retreats to a cabin nestled in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley to heal and sort out her feelings about her troubled marriage. The land was bequeathed to her husband by a maternal grandmother he never knew, and the cabin has been abandoned for years. As she is welcomed into the rural community of Toms Brook, Kendra becomes curious about an heirloom lover's knot quilty that is another piece of Isaac's unexplored past. The unusual quilt clearly has a story to tell, and Kendra is convinced that helping her husband connect with his roots might help him reconnect with her, as well. At first Isaac's reluctant visits to the cabin only underscore the difficulties in their marriage, but as circumstances force them to piece together a new relationship, Isaac discovers that the history of a family he's never known might hold the key to his future. As a passionate story of strength, loss and desperation unfolds, the secrets of two quilts are revealed and the threads of an unraveling marriage are secured. In the rich, evocative prose that earned high praise for Wedding Ring,and Endless Chain, Emilie Richards crafts the third tale in the Shenandoah Album series, resonant with the power of love and family ties.