For more than a decade, Sandra D. Bricker lived in Los Angeles. While honing her chosen craft of screenwriting in every spare moment, she worked as a personal assistant and publicist to some of daytime television’s hottest stars. When her mother became ill in Florida, she walked away from that segment of her life and moved across the country to take on a new role: Caregiver.
The Big 5-OH! was released by Abingdon Press in the Spring of 2010, and the novel was very well-received, garnering a couple of nibbles from Hollywood.
Always the Baker, Never the Bride was released by Abingdon Press in September 2010. With its phenomenal reviews, the novel spawned a series of three more books based on the popular cast of characters at The Tanglewood Inn, a wedding destination hotel in historic Roswell, Georgia. The series cemented Sandie’s spot in publishing as a flagship author of Laugh-Out-Loud romantic comedy for the inspirational market.
“Being allowed to combine my faith and my humor with my writing dream,” says Bricker, “well, that’s the best of all worlds, as far as I’m concerned!”
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Grayson McDonough has no use for teal ribbons, 5k runs, or ovarian cancer support groups now that his beautiful wife Jenna is gone. But their nine-year-old daughter Sadie seems to need the connection. When Annabelle Curtis, the beautiful cancer survivor organizing the memory quilt project for the Ovacome support group, begins to bring out the silly and fun side of his precious daughter again, Gray must set aside his own grief to support the healing of Sadie’s young heart. But is there hope for Gray’s heart too along the way?
If you would like to read the first chapter of Raw Edges, go HERE.
Watch the book trailer:
MY REVIEW:
Raw Edges is the latest novel in the Quilts of Love series published by Abingdon Press and it may be my favorite one thus far. A compelling story that is a tribute to those who have battled ovarian cancer, it features Annabelle, a survivor and Gray and his daughter Sadie who lost their beloved wife and mother Jenna. The three meet at a meeting of an ovarian cancer support group and end up working together on a quilt that will be auctioned to raise money to support research and awareness of the disease. As most readers of this type fiction can imagine, Gray and Annabelle develop a romantic relationship before book’s end but Raw Edges is much more than a romantic novel.
A cancer survivor herself, Sandra has done a stupendous (I borrowed that word from the book!) job of communicating the effect this dread disease has on both cancer survivors and the families who have lose loved ones. Sandra is known for her Laugh-Out-Loud fiction and Raw Edges definitely has its moments but there are also more sobering incidents than in her previous books. The characters were well-rounded and easy to love and I enjoyed the scenes of Annabelle and Sadie learning to make a quilt. I particularly enjoyed the entries from Jenna’s journal at the end of each chapter as she shared her heart with Sadie, knowing she would be leaving her soon.
I applaud Sandra for her excellent book and am so glad that she survived to write it. I hope that it will be an encouragement to others.
