When single parent Emma Sanchez inherits a cabin in Hawai’i, she prays the move will offer a fresh start for her seven-year-old daughter and herself.
Determined to raise Ally without a man in the picture, Emma’s resolve is tested when disaster strikes just before Christmas and the handsome rancher next door questions her independent nature.
It takes place in rural Hawaii in my neighborhood and focuses on a stubborn heroine who is resistant to asking for help.
I love the no nonsense belief of the heroine's daughter. Nothing shakes her belief in the power of an angel.
Emma Sanchez poured a glass of iced tea and sat at the kitchen table with her feet propped up on one of the old pine chairs. She lingered over the multicolored Christmas ads before she braced herself to open the electric bill. After living in Hawaiʻi for only three months, she’d already managed to miss two payments and now the power company threatened to cut off her power. Emma rubbed the back of her neck and rolled her shoulders. By the time she caught up on the electric bill and paid her car insurance, she’d have about forty-three dollars left out of her next paycheck for gas and groceries.
Good thing her boss at the grocery store had given each employee a fifteen-pound turkey for Thanksgiving. Emma figured the leftover meat with a few vegetables from her garden should feed Ally and herself for another two weeks if she bought just milk, a dozen eggs and some ramen noodles; then maybe, just maybe, she’d be able to budget a few dollars from the next check to buy Ally a Christmas present.