Kim Edwards - The Memory Keepers Daughter

Id like to express my deep appreciation to the pastors of Hunter Presbyterian Church for years of wisdom on matters seen and unseen; thanks especially to Claire Vonk Brooks, who carried the seed of this story and entrusted it to me.

Jean and Richard Covert generously shared their insights and also read an early draft of this manuscript. I am grateful to them, as well as to Meg Steinman, Caroline Baesler, Kallie Baesler, Nancy Covert, Becky Lesch, and Malkanthi McCormick, for their candor and guidance. Bruce Burris invited me to teach a workshop at Minds Wide Open; my thanks to him, and to the participants that day, who wrote straight from their hearts.

I am very grateful to the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation for exceptional support and encouragement. The Kentucky Council on the Arts and the Kentucky Foundation for Women also provided sustaining grants in support of this book, and I thank them.

As always, enormous gratitude to my agent, Geri Thoma, for being so wise, warm, generous and steadfast. Im very grateful also to all the people at Viking, especially my editor, Pamela Dorman, who brought such intelligence and engagement to editing this book, and whose insightful questions helped me walk more deeply into the narrative. Beena Kamlanis deft, perceptive editorial touch was invaluable as well, and Lucia Watson, with good cheer and precision, kept a thousand things in motion.

To writers Jane McCafferty, Mary Ann Taylor-Hall, and Leatha Kendrik, who read this manuscript with tough and loving eyes, heartfelt thanks. Special thanks also to my parents, John and Shirley Edwards. To James Alan McPherson, whose teaching still informs my own, abiding gratitude. To Katherine Soulard Turner and her father, the late William G. Turner, for rich friendship, book talk, and Pittsburgh expertise, joyous thanks as well.

Love and thanks to all my family, near and far, especially to Tom.

T HE SNOW STARTED TO FALL SEVERAL HOURS BEFORE HER labor began. A few flakes first, in the dull gray late-afternoon sky, and then wind-driven swirls and eddies around the edges of their wide front porch. He stood by her side at the window, watching sharp gusts of snow billow, then swirl and drift to the ground. All around the neighborhood, lights came on, and the naked branches of the trees turned white.

After dinner he built a fire, venturing out into the weather for wood he had piled against the garage the previous autumn. The air was bright and cold against his face, and the snow in the driveway was already halfway to his knees. He gathered logs, shaking off their soft white caps and carrying them inside. The kindling in the iron grate caught fire immediately, and he sat for a time on the hearth, cross-legged, adding logs and watching the flames leap, blue-edged and hypnotic. Outside, snow continued to fall quietly through the darkness, as bright and thick as static in the cones of light cast by the streetlights. By the time he rose and looked out the window, their car had become a soft white hill on the edge of the street. Already his footprints in the driveway had filled and disappeared.