A girl kills her mother for forcing her into prostitution and makes it look an accident. She becomes a vagabond and the novel follows her life of abuse at the hands of men, until she is rescued by social workers.

Jael hears voices. Some are real, like the voices of the others in her incest-survivor group, or the homeless woman she meets at the laundry. Some are more mysterious, like the Virgin Mary's. Jael was born into a hard life, but she's a survivor, growing stronger all the time. Waiting for the day when the only voice she needs is her own. So I was a ward of the court, and I slept on a cot in the basement of the Pentecostal church until old River Bill, a recently widowed deacon, offered to take me in. The church lady who came to bring me food and extra clothes delivered the news. As she picked nits out of my hair, she said it was a miracle from God that a man like River Bill would take a wild girl like me to raise as his own daughter . . .

At the Church of Fire and Brimstone and Gods Almighty Baptizing Wind, Grandpa Herman makes the rules for everyone, and everyone obeys, or else. Try as she might, Ninah hasn't succeeded in resisting temptation her prayer partner, James and finds herself pregnant. She fears the wrath of Grandpa Herman, the congregation and of God Himself. But the events that follow show Ninah that Gods ways are more mysterious than even Grandpa Herman understands.

Explores the works and lives of late 20th-century southern women writers (Rosemary Daniell, Connie May Fowler, Lee Smith, Sheri Reynolds, Dorothy Allison, and Valerie Martin) to show how conservative Christian ideals of femininity shaped notions of religion, sexuality, and power, and how they and their characters grappled with opposing cultural expectations.

Independent Publisher Books Awards (IPPY) Gold Medalist in Mid-Atlantic-Best Regional Fiction From the author of the New York Times #1 bestseller, The Rapture of Canaan, and steeped in the rich tradition of Southern writers like Carson McCullers and Sue Monk Kidd, The Tender Grave is the gripping story of two estranged sisters who find their unlikely way toward forgiveness—and each other—through a disturbing set of circumstances. Dori, at age 17, participates in a hate crime against a gay boy from her school and runs away to escape prosecution—and her own harrowing childhood. In her pocket, she carries the address of an older, half-sister she’s never met. She has no idea that her sister Teresa is married to another woman. When Dori and Teresa finally meet, they’re forced to confront that, while they don’t like or really even understand one another, they are inextricably bound together in ways that transcend their differences. Together, the sisters discover that shifting currents of family and connection can sometimes run deeper than the prevailing tides of abandonment and estrangement. In The Tender Grave, Sheri Reynolds weaves complex themes of parenting, forgiveness, guilt, and accountability into a lyrical and lushly-woven tapestry that chronicles our enduring search for heart, home, and healing.

#1 New York Times bestselling author Sheri Reynolds delivers an emotionally moving novel of Finch Nobles, a girl severely burned as a child, who later discovers she can hear the voices of the dead. After sustaining terrible burns from a household accident as a young girl, Finch Nobles refuses the pity of her hometown. The brave and feisty loner finds comfort in visiting her father’s cemetery, where she soon discovers that she can hear the voices of those buried underground. When she begins to speak to them, their answers echo around her in a remarkable chorus of regrets, explanations, and insights. A wonderfully wrought amalgam of Steinbeck, Faulkner, Spoon River Anthology, and Our Town, A Gracious Plenty is a masterful tale not soon forgotten.