Introduction

"Sailing for Grace" follows Will Goodbow, a wealthy businessman who makes a promise to his late wife, Grace, to help reunite migrant children separated from their parents at the border. Despite his lack of expertise in immigration matters, Will feels compelled to fulfill his promise to Grace, leading him to El Paso where he seeks to understand the situation at the US-Mexico border.

Editorial Review

No Editorial Review Currently Available

Excerpt

1

You couldn’t say that Will Goodbow was one of those people who didn’t know what he had until he’d lost it. He’d known it all along.

It made losing Grace all the harder for him, harder than losing anything before, harder, he thought, than anything he could ever lose again. But now, after all that had happened, he understood that when a loss was deep enough, it could hollow down through your lungs and gut and lie sleeping in your soul like a troubled guest. And once awakened, it could take you places you never imagined.

Besides. He had promised her.

“I want you to do this, Will Goodbow,” she’d said. Her eyes, those beautiful eyes, seemed larger as her face shrank around them. The disease was taking everything it could take. Every day a little more. Relentlessly. Even the elastic band of the knit cap she wore to cover her hairless head was loosening. It slipped down nearer one ear as she turned to him from her bed. Only a few days before, when they sailed together on their yacht, The Sails of Grace, the cap had stayed put.

“I understand what you want,” Will said.

“But you haven’t said you will do it.”

It was true. He hadn’t. He had his reasons. For one, he didn’t want to do it. He didn’t share Grace’s passion for the whole issue; in truth not genuinely for any part of the problem. And he wouldn’t know how to do it even if he did care about it the way she did. He wasn’t a lawyer, he knew nothing of the process or the rules, or if it was even legally possible for anyone to do what Grace asked. Hell, I’ve never even been to the place, he told himself.

Of course, he could just lie to her. Assure her he would do what she asked and, knowing him as she did, believing in him as she did, loving him as she did, she would accept his word. Leave this. Take him off the hook. He’d read that it happened often in families: untruths to the dying, assurances of hope unfounded, palliative deception. He knew he could do that and be done with it, just move on. But knowing he could assuage her falsely only underscored his conflict, because more than anything, more even than his hope that she would stop insisting on this thing from him, he did not want to deceive her, could not. She was not the perfect wife. Who could be? But she was more perfect, Will judged, than anyone or anything else in his life, so much more perfect than himself. What do you owe such a love when it is ending? When life is leaving? Whatever else, surely you owed honesty, Will Goodbow thought.

He searched for safe ground. “I promise you I will look into it,” he said.

It wasn’t enough. She raised her chest from the bed and looked into his eyes, fiercely.

“No, Will Goodbow! You will not ‘look into it!’” Grace said. “This is not a business prospect.” If it can be said that contempt can be uttered gently, she had succeeded. If barely. “Don’t give me ‘look into it,’ Will Goodbow!’”

Will rose from his chair next to her and turned away. He moved his large hands from his hips to his pockets, and back again. Finally, he turned back to her.

“You know that if I say I will do it, Grace, if I say that to you, I will really have to do it,” Will said. “Especially now.”

He did not look away, though he wanted to. His eyes were locked on hers. Each knew the depth of the other’s pleading. Each nearly seventy-years old, they’d been together nearly forty. When you have loved that long, you know these things.

“Of course, I know that,” she said. “Why else would I want you to promise it? And I know it will be impossible to help all of them. But some of them, Will. You must help some of them! Promise it to me. Promise me you will help some of them, Will. Promise me now. Promise my soul. Because there has never been anything that you really tried to do that you couldn’t do. That you didn’t do.”

Will moved to her and held her face in his large hands.

“Oh, Grace,” he said. “My good, good Grace. I promise you. I promise you I will do it. I will do it for as many as I can.”

The doorbell rang, announcing the young man from home hospice.

_____________________

She died the next night. Will was at her side. She did not speak again about his promise. She knew she needn’t. view abbreviated excerpt only...

Discussion Questions

Discussion Topic Suggestions from the author:

How the current political climate, particularly the immigration crisis, affects our society

How personal relationships can be strained due to external political pressures and systemic injustices

How having differing political views can affect relationships, particularly a marriage

His motivation behind writing this novel and his writing process

His writing style, how he manages to write in a way that allows for balanced pacing, a story that unfolds gradually and deep character development

Weblinks

»	Author's website

Book Club Recommendations

Recommended to book clubs by 0 of 0 members.

Member Reviews

There are no user reviews at this time.
Rate this book