A Fatal Love of Place

HANNAH LARKIN HORNE watches helplessly as the rich dark earth falls on her husband's casket, one shovelful at a time. Riddled with grief and guilt, she can hardly believe what her life has become because she begged her husband to move back to West Virginia. Now her husband is dead, and her son is accused of murdering him. Worse yet, Hannah believes she caused it all.

As police sergeant Keith McCauley attempts to comfort Hannah at the cemetery, she is numb with dismay as she reflects back on her childhood on their mountainous West Virginia farm. Her days were filled with forays into the woods seeking mountain tea, huckleberries, and hazelnuts as well as attempting to make friends with small animals which became pets. At the age of twelve Hannah's life was drastically altered when her family was forced to move to Washington State. For the next ten years, her life became one of grief for her loss and a devastating longing to be back on the farm. Eventually she attends college where she meets and marries Bill Larkin. Bill knows of her longing for West Virginia and when he becomes dissatisfied with his work he decides to move Hannah home. When her son is born, Hannah feels her world is complete and like a fairy tale it remains that way for eighteen years.

"A Fatal Love of Place" shares the first installment in a mysterious tale with spider-web tentacles of drug abuse, deceit, and unfaithfulness in which Hannah Larkin's family becomes snared. The sustaining power of Hannah's faith in a benevolent God and her love for her son kept her strong and resilient and full of hope for a brighter future.