Choice

by Kimberly Burton Allen, Todd Hebertson (Illustrator)

Jody Carpenter Maclain’s daughter has never known she was the product of one humiliating sexual experience that drove her father, Keith Ackerson, out of the closet and Jody into a lifetime of self-recrimination. While Jody later meets and marries Alex Maclain, when Keith learns he has fathered a child he insists upon being involved in their daughter Kendall’s life. Jody, Keith and Alex come to an agreement: When Kendall turns twenty-one, the three of them will tell her the truth of her parentage.

No one could guess that Keith would die a year shy of that milestone birthday.

Keith’s death throws Jody into a tailspin of long-buried emotions. In the wake of her choices past and present, she wavers over the biggest question: Need she tell Kendall the truth now? The consequences of her hesitation are swift and agonizing, and Jody faces an ultimatum: Unless she can extract herself from Keith’s shadow and expunge her culpability, the price of her self-doubt may be the loss of all she loves best.

263 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 9, 2014

About the author

A native of Orange County, California, Kimberly Burton Allen is the author of two nonfictions books: the memoir A Butler’s Life: Scenes from the Other Side of the Silver Salver, and Wedding Wonders: Tales & Traditions, Customs & Curiosities; three novels, Blood Exposure, Net Stalker and Choice; and a cookbook, A Butler's Manor: The Cookbook. She lives on the East End of Long Island, New York, where she and her husband own and operate a bed and breakfast. Follow her blogs at http://blog.abutlersmanor.com/ and http://kimberlyburtonallen.blogspot.com/.