The Healing Years

The story of a woman in rural North Carolina who grows up in hard times endures many sorrows but persists to become a respected healer in her community. A woman of great wisdom and strength who through her healing years she helps many people and eventually discovers how to heal her own heart. REVIEW: It immediately draws from me the adjective 'genuine.' Ruby is a wonderful creation maybe a mosaic of more than one woman. She has 'the gift' all right - not only for healing with roots and herbs and wise counsel - but also for patience and for love and steady affection. Such upright characters are hard to draw convincingly; they go against the grain of our skepticism. But when you get them right they are strong. What you have here is strong a memoir-chronicle about a kind of community and a way of life not so well known anymore. The 'retreat' to yard and garden at the end is a kind of saintly benediction. ~ Fred Chappell poet novelist teacher; Poet Laureate of N.C. (1997-2002)