The boundary between battlefield and home front blurs. Are there wounds love can heal?
Marleigh Mulcahy grew up in a boxing gym, the daughter of hard-drinking parents who didn't keep a stable roof overhead. In the cinder-block Box-n-Go, amidst the sweat and funk, she meets EOD specialist Jace Holt, a highly and expensively trained bomb diffuser with three successful deployments behind him. With a heady mix of hope, carelessness, and a ridiculous amount of courage, they begin a family. When Jace returns to active duty, a roadside bomb resurrects ghosts from the couple's past and threatens the life they've built.An unflinching and timely gaze into the marriage of an enlisted special operator and his wife, Breach is a story of betting it all on love, a couple's determination to change the trajectory of their lives, and one woman's promises to the man she loves and the boys they're raising.
What choices will a desperate mother make to keep her family whole?
- Publisher : Koehler Books (May 17, 2022)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 312 pages
- ISBN-10 : 164663649X
- ISBN-13 : 978-1646636495
- Item Weight : 1.01 pounds
- Dimensions : 6 x 0.7 x 9 inches
I received a copy of this book from Michelle Fitzgerald, Publicity Director at FSB Associates
Review: Breach by Kelly Sokol
In a simple context, I believe this is a book about the meaning of love and identifying with that person. Beyond that, it looks at how emotionally traumatic experiences affect those serving in the military making it more likely that they may have an issue with re-entry into civilian life.
Page one of this well-written book mentions what happens when we are sleeping and sets the stage for us to recognize that clearing away damage is essential for us to survive and thrive.
The very first chapter of the book draws us into this love story with the protagonist Marleigh meeting Jace and stating she'd be able to sense him somehow, even if she couldn't see him. Interestingly, many people believe that body odor is more important for attraction than appearance and that people put off a natural scent that may or may not attract different people.
Marleigh and Jace hook up at a traumatic time and together they go on to create a family. Sokol related how previous experiences tied into Marleigh's and Jace's perception of life's events and I must state that I felt Sokol's description of the Holt family unit seemed very true to what one might expect.
This carefully crafted love story points out the positive and negative effects of traumatic experiences and I appreciated how the Sioux legend tied into the story as well as the italicized communications while Jace was deployed.
This story made me think about the statement “ounces equal pounds, pounds equal pain,” being used as a description for more than just innovative material choices as people often express emotions in terms of weight - such as a "heavy heart".
There are many things you can learn from this book. I felt the most important takeaway was that we connect with others when we share experiences. In the process of sharing trauma, we learn to, cope with mistakes or changes in our environment and we learn to appreciate life, see new possibilities, and set new goals.
About the Author
Kelly Sokol's debut novel, The Unprotected, was named one of Book Riot's 100 Must-Read Books on Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Mothering. Her work has appeared in publications, including Alpinist, The Manifest-Station, and ConnotationPress, and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Kelly was awarded a National Parks Artist's residency in 2018. She serves on the board of directors for the Muse Writers Center in Norfolk, Virginia, where she also teaches fiction writing. She received her MFA from Goddard College.