Dear Carolina + $1,000 Shopping Spree!

Today would have been Nellie Bly's 151st birthday. This is worth mentioning because not only was she a trailblazing investigative journalist and adventurer extraordinaire, she was my first hero. Before I was even old enough to go to school, I was pretending to be her and I'm sure, somewhere deep down, my love for books can be attributed to her fearlessness.

Today is also a big day for my friend Kristy Woodson Harvey. She wrote a book! It's called Dear Carolina and is about mothers. --Perfect for Mother's Day--

The story is told from the dual perspectives of Jodi, a nineteen-year-old who's had a rough life and finds herself pregnant and alone, and Khaki, a successful interior designer whose family feels incomplete without a baby. And it.is.amazing!

Dear Carolina is set in North Carolina, which is where Kristy lives in real life with her husband and three-year-old son.

Kristy Woodson Harvey

I'm a fan of Design Chic, the beautiful blog that Kristy and her mom, Beth, co-write. Kristy also connects with readers at kristywoodsonharvey.com and is a regular contributor for The Salisbury Post, Domino magazine, and Houzz. Kristy is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's school of journalism and holds a Master's in English from East Carolina University. In other words, girl can write. And let me tell you, this book is GOOD!

I started reading an advance copy of Dear Carolina this past weekend, and I just want to lock myself away so I can tear through the rest of it (and I would be done if it hadn't been the last weekend of work on the One Room Challenge). Anyway, I just cannot wait to see what happens next. A real feat considering I know the big outline of the ending: Jodi will ask the "ultimate favor"/Khaki will adopt baby Carolina. There are so many interesting, well-developed characters in the book, and the supporting relationships in the story also contribute to the theme that families are made, not just born.

My favorite authors have a way of using words to cut right to whatever it is I'm feeling. It's like they have a special window into my soul. That's true with Dear Carolina. A story about a mother who sacrifices her own role in order to give her child the relationships she needs and a woman whose heart breaks to ask "what if I never get to buckle another baby seat into the back?"

Buy it from one of these sellers:

BARNES AND NOBLE | INDIEBOUND | BOOKS A MILLION | AMAZON | POWELLS | TARGET | iTUNES | GOOGLE PLAY | KOBO

Catalano Architects via Design Chic

To see more beautiful pictures of the houses of Dear Carolina, visit this blog post.

 

And enter a special contest to win a $1,000 shopping spree!!!