Joanne Kukanza Easley

Sweet Jane by Joanne Kukanza Easley

2021 Eric Hoffer Book Award - Finalist 2020 PenCraft Award Winner - Women's Fiction 2020 International Book Awards Finalist - Literary 2020 Readers Favorite Book Awards Finalist - Literary 2019 Faulkner/Wisdom Writing Award Finalist

A drunken mother makes childhood ugly. Jane runs away at sixteen, determined to leave her fraught upbringing in the rearview. Vowing never to return, she hitchhikes to California, right on time for the Summer of Love. Seventeen years later, she looks good on paper: married, grad school, sober, but her carefully constructed life is crumbling. When Mama dies, Jane returns for the funeral, leaving her husband in the dark about her history. Seeing her childhood home and significant people from her youth catapults Jane back to the events that made her the woman she is. She faces down her past and the ghosts that shaped her family. A stunning discovery helps Jane see her problems through a new lens.