Codys mother dies before she can answer the fifteen-year-olds question: Who is my father? Homeless, Cody is first aided by a kindly landlady, later abruptly forced into a sadistic foster home. He flees in desperate search for his real father, but is caught and put into a juvenile facility, from which he narrowly escapes. Free again, he hitchhikes across country, running into people who help, but hindered by others. Jobless and penniless, he learns to survive on the brutal streets. Cody discovers shocking facts about his mother, and as he continues his search, discovers truths about himself before he finds a solution.

1885 Leaving behind a small, picturesque village, Poppy Townsend closes the doors of her dress shop and takes a riverboat south on the Mississippi to find out why her estranged maternal grandfather, on his deathbed, has summoned her. Finding her grandfather’s home filled with boarders who seem to care for him, Poppy gets to know each one while searching for answers to the scandalous rumor told about her father...and the sudden disappearance and death of her mother from a visit two years before. She falls for the handsome and mysterious Jack Stoneking, a younger friend and employee to her grandfather. Even as her mind has been clouded by the touch of Jack’s hand, she refuses to leave any stone unturned. Upon finding an obscure garden hidden on her grandfather’s vast estate, Poppy uncovers something more shocking than the vicious gossip told about her family. And her discovery shakes everyone’s world.

How sad the people all of their lives who have no love to give. How blessed by God are the ones unloved when they learn to forgive.

This book chronicles the timeless service of Phi Mu Omega chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha from its humble beginnings as Ivy Omega Interest Group in 1998, to its chartering on January 15, 2000, to its present status as a thriving chapter living out the sorority's motto to be "Supreme in Service to All Mankind". This history book was a time-intensive and labor-intensive assignment for women who are already busy, career-minded, and community-service oriented , but it truly became a labor or love which International President Carolyn House Stewart requested of each chapter of the sorority. Without her directive, this book, in all certainty, would never have been written. The project has indelibly etched valuable lessons in the minds of the historian and chapter members--the need for archiving and documenting the chapter's programs, activities, events, and projects. The assignment also refocused attention on previous and current international initiatives issued by each international president. According to historian Earnestine Green McNealey, Ph.D., author of the sorority's definitive history book The Pearls of Alpha Kappa Alpha: A History of America's First Black Sorority, until the lion tells its own story, the story will always glorify the hunter. This project forced chapters across the United States and in other countries to tell our own stories from their perspectives and in the context of historical events and social issues facing the communities we serve. Hopefully, it also reinforced the raison d'etre for every member, every chapter, every region, and the international sisterhood. The beginning and evolving history of Phi Mu Omega is captured for generations of young women yet to come so that it might inspire and motivate them to become women with a desire to serve all mankind.