Follow this link to an interesting review of The Dream Bucket: I enjoyed the book (dated March 30, 2016) You will need to scroll down to find this four-star review..
Here is my response:
Thank you for your
excellent review. I don’t make a practice of responding to reviews, but your
comments need to be noticed by other readers. I’d like to discuss the issues
you have mentioned.
First, let me say I’m opposed
to domestic violence. Readers will find depictions of various forms of domestic
abuse in Abi of Cyrene and each book in the Covington Chronicles. In Abi of
Cyrene, Abi’s father brutalizes her. In Secret Promise, Caroline is a pathetic
victim of physical abuse from a parent figure, Loretta in The Courtship of Miss
Loretta Larson receives some physical abuse and horrible emotional abuse, Zoe
in The Dream Bucket suffers in silence, and Manuela in Manuela Blayne receives
the worst abuse of all.
Thank you for saying
you were uncomfortable reading it. Writing it was painful. Women who have read
Manuela Blayne scream in outrage. I try to address these abusive situations
accurately as I show how the culture has accepted mistreatment of helpless
victims. Without giving away any endings
of my books, I’ll just say I want readers to feel the indignation that you
expressed.
In the real world
domestic abuse has been glossed over and often accepted. Until a few decades
ago, many men well-respected in their communities claimed the right to spank or
slap their wives as punishment. I recall comedies filmed in the fifties and
sixties in which men spanked their women. These scenes infuriate me. My goal as
a writer is to show how conditions have been. I try not to rewrite history but
to depict it realistically.
As The Dream Bucket
begins, Trudy is a spoiled girl with an unrealistic admiration for her father,
who is a scoundrel. He remains a central character throughout most of the book.
Billy Jack’s character develops further in Manuela Blayne. I’d love to hear
your response to that book.
