How far would you go to keep your baby or to have a baby to call your own? That’s the question asked of readers early on in Jamie Zeppa’s captivating new novel Every Time We Say Goodbye (Knopf Canada).
Every Time We Say Goodbye follows the story of the Turner family, jumping back and forth from 1942 to 1973. During the former, a young Grace Turner becomes pregnant out of wedlock and faces a difficult decision of what to do – raise her son alone and leave him in the care of her brother and sister-in-law. In the latter, eight-year-old Dawn Turner prays for a normal family, only to feel herself succumbing to the disease that plagued her family for decades.
Rife with raw and stifled emotion, broken dreams and broken hearts, this novel is a less a quiet triumph than a thunderous tour de force that keeps you laughing, hoping and turning every page until hours have slipped by. Zeppa pulled me into her family saga right from the start, wanting to mother each character and tell them everything will be alright, all the while having no idea where the next chapter would lead and being ensnared in bigger twists and turns and loving every moment.
How far would you go for family? Read Zeppa’s Every Time We Say Goodbye and see if you agree.
First published on MySweetBaby.ca March 2011.
Heather Camlot 