Riding the gold curve

In this sweeping novel of love and hate, Abby Palmer's life story is a study in contrasts. She calls up the courage to battle debilitating episodes of multiple sclerosis, yet is too cowardly to admit she has the disease. Abby finds the strength to survive the almost simultaneous deaths of her mother, her husband, and her unborn child, but is too weak to fight her brother's cruel domination. She is cared for by friends and abandoned by her family as she struggles to live with a disease that gradually destroys her fierce quest for independence. When first diagnosed with MS, Abby is a young divorced mother working as a public health nurse in Texas. Twenty-five years later, when the novel ends, she is starting a new life as a health educator in North Carolina. The years in between are a mix of despair and triumph as Abby fights to survive. Her children are taken away from her; she is hospitalized for alcohol abuse; she nearly dies in a car accident; and her body is ravaged by two major episodes of multiple sclerosis. When her MS is in remission, Abby devotes herself to nursing migrant farm workers in Kansas and Native Americans in Alaska. The work is physically and emotionally demanding, but Abby's dedication to the health needs of the poor is stronger than her concern for her own health. Abby Palmer is a heroine in the truest sense of the word, and Riding the Gold Curve, Faye Morgan's legacy, is a tribute to the human spirit.