Kristin Hannah is the New York Times bestselling author of novels including Firefly Lane, True Colors and Winter Garden. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Somewhere between the dining room and the living room, she banged into a side table and almost fell. I felt the strength of this book came from the redemption of the characters as they endure and come through the fire even stronger.

An emotionally-complex, heartwrenching novel about love, family, motherhood, loss, and redemption, 'Fly Away' reminds us that where there is life, there is hope and where there is love, there is forgiveness. But then Kate is diagnosed with terminal cancer, and, as with the series, Tully drops everything to reconcile with her before her death. This book explores the devastation of losing one’s lifelong best friend , a loss maybe as devastating as a spouse or a parent, but one that is rarely spoken about or acknowledged for the great impact it has on the best friend who is left alive . It became a novel about what happens when the one person who matters to you—the person who holds a whole family together—is lost. The way Kristen Hannah executed the conversations between Kate and Tully was nothing short of beautiful.And also be like, ‘Oh, I’m surprised by this, but it’s cool because it’s in the spirit of the book, but it’s a different thing. FLY AWAY is the story of three women who have lost their way and need each other plus a miracle to transform their lives.

Nancy: Well before either of you, I was definitely hanging out with people I should have never been around. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. What narrative devices did the author use to bring the more mystical elements of life, death, and life-after-death to the novel?

Her father, Johnny, strives to hold the family together, but even with his best efforts, Marah becomes unreachable in her grief. We have a bunch of point of view characters, and we go over the same events from all of their points of view. It was a compelling read and this second book lets us in on the story behind Tully’s mom’s life and why she was an absent parent. One of the biggest differences between the Firefly Lane novel and the Netflix adaptation is, of course, that Kate is the one who passes away—not her father, Bud.

The book examines diverse relationships and helps you understand why people might behave as they do - when nobody else realises the pain and the trauma that they are hiding from themselves as well as others. Now Kate has died of cancer, and Tully, whose once-stellar TV talk show career is in free fall, is wracked with guilt over her failure to be there for Kate until her very last days. Tully’s accident brings together her family and friends and helps her mum Dorothy redeem her love for her daughter. It wasn’t Marah’s fault Tully did what she did, but it did prompt Tully to take that drive that night. I wrote so many versions of Tully and Cloud and Marah and Johnny that my head couldn't hold them all.Her first novel published in the UK, Night Road , was one of eight books selected for the UK's 2011 TV Book Club Summer Read. As Kate and Johnny’s daughter, Marah, pulls further and further away from her family, she ultimately does something that breaks Tully’s heart. Tully tries to fulfill her deathbed promise to Kate--to be there for Kate's children--but Tully knows nothing about family or motherhood or taking care of people. Then Margie started to encourage Dorothy to reach out to Tully, and she helped her through the mending of that relationship. Kristin Hannah did a wonderful job of depicting the true life grit and grief that befalls a family after the death of a loved one.