This quartet of fictional autobiography centers around the life of Jane Bertram, a 20th-century American woman as she struggles to navigate the emotional wreckage of a traumatic childhood and the complexities of adulthood.
Book One
Blackbird
Can Jane find the resilience needed to survive?
The idealized scenes in Norman Rockwell’s illustrations seldom reflected the reality of American families, including Jane Bertram’s. Her world consists of a mostly absent father and an angry mother who vents her frustration on her daughter.
Jane stubbornly refuses to become a victim, a stance that further infuriates her mother. Despite the overwhelming pain of knowing her mother hates her, Jane is determined to create a new life for herself.
Blackbird, a fictional autobiography, is the first book in a quartet that explores the taboo subject of mother-daughter abuse. The story spans a period in American history when women began to redefine their traditional roles.
Book Two
My Mother's Daughter
Feeling as if she had no choice but to abandon her newborn to the authorities, Jane Bertram is eager to turn her life around. She escapes Iowa aboard a train to Chicago, determined to rise above her abusive past, hoping a new environment will allow her to break away from her dysfunctional relationships and start over.
Memories, however, can never be left behind, and some wounds never heal. Can Jane silence her mother’s harsh criticism echoing in her head, or is she condemned to follow in her mother’s footsteps? Will her struggles lead to personal growth or only more heartache?
My Mother’s Daughter is the second novel of a four-book fictional autobiographical series that began with Blackbird. This series explores the taboo subject of mother-daughter abuse.
Book three
The Perfect Mother
A return to Iowa for her sister’s funeral forces Jane Bertram to confront long-buried memories and uncomfortable truths. Is she more like her mother than she’d like to admit? Has she made the same mistakes despite her best intentions?
Surprised by her aging mother’s whispered expression of regret, Jane weighs the possibility of reconciliation. Is there a path forward?
Could Jane’s struggle to find inner peace ultimately depend on forgiving her mother? And herself? Is a transformation from decades of resentment to sincere appreciation possible?
The Perfect Mother is the third novel of a four-book series that began with Blackbird and My Mother’s Daughter. The quintet explores the taboos, history, and texture of one woman’s struggles during a profoundly transformative period of the 20th century.
Book Four
The First ANd LAst Lesson
Jane Bertram has everything she could ask for. A loving partner. Friends. A beautiful home. Security. Then, time takes them away. Having worked so hard and lost so much, can an ailing Jane once again overcome old demons? Or will she succumb to long-buried shadows and ghosts? With time running out, will she remember how to spin straw into gold?
The First and Last Lesson is the fourth novel of a four-book series that began with Blackbird and includes My Mother’s Daughter and The Perfect Mother. The quartet explores the taboos, history, and texture of women’s struggles during a profoundly transformative period of the twentieth century.
