Johnnie always hated her name. Johnnie was named after her uncle who died a few months before she was born. This isn't the worst problem she has. Johnnie went though her young life with a mother who always disappeared, sometimes weeks sometimes months before returning home. Johnnie also has an eating disorder.
Johnnie has overcome the eating disorder, due to the help of her husband Dale. Than one day everything comes crashing down around her. Back when they were first married, Dale was gone a lot on business, leaving Johnnie at home and very alone. Johnnie had a short affair with a man that Dale hated.
While trying to straighten her life a new problem arises. Her mother seems to be hiding out in town. Johnnie is only getting glimpse of her here and there, but can never caught up with her.
Kathleen M Rodgers book is truly an inspiration to any one who has gone though an eating disorder. I did have a cousin who had this same problem, so JOHNNIE COME LATELY really touched me.
Eating disorders is not the only issue facing young people today that Rodgers talks about in JOHNNIE COME LATELY. She also discusses the effect that war has on those who go to fight and the family they leave behind, as Johnnie's son enlists and this is one more problem Johnnie has to learn to deal with.
JOHNNIE COME LATELY is a great book. It's a little hard to read this and not feel for the characters.
Would life have been different for Johnnie if she'd been
named after a woman rather than her dead uncle? Or if her
mama hadn't been quite so beautiful or flighty? The
grandparents who raised her were loving, but they didn't
understand the turmoil roiling within her. And they had
so many, many secrets. Why did her mama leave? Would she
ever return? How did her Uncle Johnny really die? Who was
her father?
Now Johnnie Kitchen is a 43-year-old woman with three
beautiful children, two of them grown. She has a
handsome, hardworking husband who adores her, and they
live in the historic North Texas town of Portion in a
charming bungalow. But she never finished college and her
only creative outlet is a journal of letters addressed to
both the living and the dead. Although she has conquered
the bulimia that almost killed her, Johnnie can never let
down her guard, lest the old demons return. Or perhaps
they never went away to begin with. For Johnnie has
secrets of her own, and her worst fear is that the life
she's always wanted--the one where she gets to pursue
her own dreams--will never begin.
Not until her ghosts reveal themselves.
No excerpt available.
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