We Are All Welcome Here
Bestselling author Elizabeth Berg's latest novel, We Are All Welcome Here, is based on a true story sent in from a reader.
35 year old Paige Dunn is confined to a wheelchair and only able to move her head. She contracted polio while pregnant with her daughter, Diana, and gave birth to her while in an iron lung. Diana's father left when he learned that Paige would not fully recover.
The action in the story occurs during the Freedom Summer of 1964 in Tupelo, Mississippi (the birthplace of Elvis). Diana is now thirteen and has been helping with her mother's constant needs since the age of ten along with the help of tough-talking black caregiver, Peacie. Paige, Diana and Peacie are all trapped in their lives. Paige tries, unsuccessfully at times, to keep control of her poverty-stricken household and live as normal a life as possible. Diana rebels against the constraints in her life. And Peacie longs to leave Mississippi with her boyfriend to join the civil rights movement in Memphis.
I've read many of Elizabeth Berg's novels and found this one to be a thought-provoking and well-written story.
Comments
I read this one too and loved it. Since I always read Elizabeth Berg's books I did not read ANYTHING about it in advance. If I had, the plot description would've made me nervous... as it sounds too much like at Lifetime movie. But... I agree with Lesley that it was thought-provoking and well-written. Somehow she avoids making the reader feel sorry for the characters. You feel *with* them instead. Knowing that the book was based on a real mother/daughter pair helps make this incredible story believable.
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