Bitterroot Landing

Bitterroot Landing introduces Jael, born into a hard life, but a survivor. She will survive even River Bill. The almost impersonal kindness of strangers will rescue her; a priest with a good heart will shelter and teach her; a careful man will take his time and love her back into the world. Voices have always spoken to Jael in her mind, and some of what they have told her to do has been frightening. But the voices she hears now speak of comfort and courage, teaching her to master the ways other people manage to live. Jael has a job now, cleaning in a church, and a room of her own in the church's basement. As she dusts the statue of the Virgin Mary, the Virgin speaks peace to her. "There's definitely too much hurt around here," she says. "In flaws, you find the truth," says the small, dark figure of a woman Jael sculpts out of wax. "Come and look at the moon," says the homeless woman she meets at the laundromat. "Hello, I'm an incest survivor," say the women in the recovery group that meets every week in the church, just the other side of Jael's room. Voices both real and imagined make Jael stronger every day, until she finds she no longer needs them. Until she finds that at last she has a voice of her own.