Family Secrets: Does the Truth Heal or Harm?
Love story by Mary DeMuth unveils freedom and hope in answering questions of the past
Mary DeMuth’s latest novel tackles the issue of unveiling family secrets and the effects that follow. A love story, The Muir House (Zondervan, July 2011) explores suffering, healing, and the choices that can change a life forever. Bravely calling on her formerly hidden family secrets, DeMuth continues to offer hope to others.
In The Muir House, Willa Muir is dating the man of her dreams, Hale, and he has asked for her hand in marriage. But she can’t say yes to the love of her life until she remembers what happened when she was 4 years old. Taking an unexpected trip back home to Rockwall, TX to the Muir House Bed & Breakfast after being away for eight years, Willa is determined to unbury the deep family secrets that have been haunting her dreams. When Willa finally unveils the answers she’s been searching for, her heart collapses. Can Willa shake her past to embrace a love that could finally lead her home?
DeMuth was raised in a difficult home surrounded by drug abuse, and at the age of five, she was repeatedly raped by neighborhood boys. At 10 years old, during her mother’s third marriage, DeMuth’s biological father passed away. When she encountered the true love of Jesus Christ at a Young Life camp in high school, God helped DeMuth guide her new life course to hope and healing. In DeMuth’s memoir, Thin Places (Zondervan, February 2010), she shares this painful, personal side of her childhood, but the story is more about finding peace and the healing power of faith.
Many of us are haunted with past memories, preventing a life of freedom and hope. To help others be set free, DeMuth has created a blog for visitors to anonymously share their family secrets. Since the blog launched in February 2009, 270 survivors have emailed their family secrets for DeMuth to anonymously post. To learn more, visit: blog.myfamilysecrets.org.
About Mary Demuth
Author and speaker Mary DeMuth helps people live uncaged. She is the author of several southern novels including A Slow Burn, Life in Defiance and the Christy Award finalists Watching the Tree Limbs and Daisy Chain. She’s also written four parenting books and a memoir, Thin Places. Passionate about the written word, DeMuth teaches and mentors writers at the Rockwall Christian Writers Group (rcwg.blogspot.com) and The Writing Spa (thewritingspa.com). She lives in Rockwall, Texas with her husband, Patrick, and their three children.
To learn more, visit marydemuth.com.
About The Muir House
By Mary DeMuth
Zondervan
9780310330332
336 Pages
$14.99
Softcover
PUB DATE: July 2010
Endorsements for The Muir House by Mary DeMuth
“Mary DeMuth is a master at telling relevant stories that explore the wrenching need we all have to find love and affirmation outside of ourselves. Her characters in The Muir House are as real as the sun on your face, the rain on your sleeve, and the breath in your lungs.”
—Susan Meissner, author of The Shape of Mercy
“As the director of Proverbs 31 Ministries’ fiction division, She Reads, I select and promote the best inspirational fiction out there. I wait for new novels by Mary DeMuth because I know I can recommend them wholeheartedly. The Muir House does not disappoint.”
—Marybeth Whalen, director of She Reads, author of The Mailbox and She Makes It Look Easy
“You know the minute you open a DeMuth book that you are in the hands of a superior storyteller. Rich, masterful, poignant, and spellbinding, The Muir House is DeMuth’s best yet.”
—Tosca Lee, author of Havah: The Story of Eve
“I read The Muir House in one day, alternating between wanting to put down the book and not learn the secrets of Willa’s life and reading each page as fast as possible so I could get to the next. Mary Demuth is a rare writer whose vulnerability can only come from laying her head on the breast of Jesus and tapping out his heartbeat onto the page.”
—Tracey Bateman, author of Thirsty and Tandem
“Perhaps nothing is more powerful than the secrets we keep—and the ones that keep us. Can the truth really set us free? Mary DeMuth confronts that question in unexpected ways through a soul-stirring, page-turning story about home and what our hearts need to know most.” —Holley Gerth, writer and counselor
“A captivating read filled with mystery and drama, The Muir House has you cheering for Willa as she searches her past in order to come to terms with her future. Mary DeMuth’s well-crafted story makes readers ponder what home really means—for her characters and for each of us.”
—Alice J. Wisler, author of Rain Song, How Sweet It Is and Hatteras Girl
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