Receive Me Falling-Erika Robuck

Receive Me Falling
Erika Robuck
Elysian Field Press, Jun 2009, $14.95
ISBN: 9780982229804

With the sudden deaths of her parents due to a car accident on the night of her engagement party, grieving Meghan Owen learns she inherited a plantation on the Caribbean island of Nevis. She makes a rash decision to get away leaving behind her consoling fiancé Brian by visiting the estate. She especially wants to see it when she learns her dad betrayed her image of him when the family lawyer explains the place was bought with stolen money and she will need to sell it to pay her father’s debts. Still she plans to learn the history of Eden.

In the 1830s, Catherine Dall’s alcoholic father owns Eden, a sugar plantation that employs over a hundred slaves. However, while her dad buries himself in drink, Catherine oversees the plantation though is very disturbed over using slave labor even as she defends her family’s practice.

This is a well written interesting tale with a fascinating premise of two women over a century apart connected by the same plantation and by a need to find a way to forgive their respective fathers for transgressions that haunts them. The story line is fast-paced though changing time periods throughout as the anchor of the Island of Nevis enables the two subplots to flow smoothly. Although key support characters like Brian, the lead women’s fathers, Meg’s mom, and a slave who dies seem underdeveloped though important to understanding the two stars, fans of strong character thrillers will enjoy this profound look at being born free.

Harriet Klausner