Sacred Dust

Book excerpt: Haunting, provocative, revelatory, "Sacred Dust is a novel of two women who form an unlikely friendship as they help one another escape the agonizing ties that bind them to the past. When Lily first moves next door to Rose of Sharon in the all-white community of Prince George County, Alabama, it looks as though the two women have nothing in common. Lily is beautiful, the unhappy--and restless--wife of a man who politely refuses to join in with Rose of Sharon's husband and the other Klan members who carry on a tradition set by their daddies, and their daddies before them. Lily objects to the entrenched way of life her new neighbors seem so comfortable with--a way of life Rose became numb to a long time ago. But a brutal murder--and an impulse to better their own lives--set Rose and Lily off on an emotional journey of self-discovery that encompasses past and present and brings each of them face-to-face with frightening--and astounding--truths. "Sacred Dust is a tale of redemption, and the freedom that comes when one person dares to tell the truth.