DEAR FAMILY by Camille Bittle...

"You must be worn out, Dorothy -Why don't you go up to your room and lie down? I'll listen for Virgil, " I'm not tired", It wouldn't hurt to rest." How can I rest thought Dorothy wasn't it better to sit with her eyes wide open staring at fimiliar things, than risk the inner visions of her mind....


In the desperate days of depression there was one constant that most people could count on-Family, This was true of the Beanes, who had endured in the past and would certainly do the same now...

When Dorothy Beane's husband, Ed, suddenly loses his job to the Great Depression, the Beanes are forced back to Dorothy's childhood home in Havenhill, Massachusettes, and under the roof of her strong-minded mother. Hard times will work to tear the family apart. Not only will the young couple lose much of their privacy and independence, but Ed must leave their new home in search of work, and the onset of the Second World War will ultimately send their son and daughter far away. Through it all strength, hope, humor, and most of all, family will help the Beanes to survive.

Camille Bittle's marvelous portrait of three generation of a New England family brings to life Depression-era America at a most personal level. In Dear Family she had created a rich and intimate novel about life, loss, memory, and the tides that bind people together in good times and bad.

Review: "A beautifully written book about real human beings who endure real tragedies and rejoice in real triumphs and are always strengthen by a real sense of kinship. In short, Dear Family is a real masterpiece."--Francis Gray Patton, author of Good morning, Miss Dove.