Kay’s Introduction to Celebration!

The theme of Celebration! makes this novel a perfect choice for a book discussion group. Women of all ages struggle with the question of what makes them worthy. Most of us are heavily impacted by our “people-are-only-consumers” culture.

We are always searching for something outside of ourselves that will makes us feel worthy. Some of us obsess about our physical appearance and material possessions; others obsess about our professional accomplishments; still others obsess about the success level of our families, particularly our children. The list goes on and on…… No matter how much we do, how many people we please, we can’t seem to do enough. Women seem to be driven to feel unworthy.

The heroine of Celebration! is a modern woman named Rachel, who has, in fact, accomplished much in her life. She’s also beautiful and has plenty of money. Still, she feels worthless. Where is her sense of worthlessness coming from? The temptation is to look into her family and search out the dysfunction that must lie at the base of Rachel’s feelings of worthlessness. We will definitely find dysfunction in Rachel’s family; most likely we’ll find it in all our families.

Then what do we do? We recognize that we were mistreated in some way (or at least we thought so), but are we stuck with other people’s definition of our worth? In fact, is other peoples’ definition of us the source of our worth at all?

The good news for Rachel is that circumstances force her to run away to a boarded-up plantation house in Louisiana. There she meets Lovey, a wise, elderly housekeeper. She also finds some Civil War diaries in the attic and learns how her ancestors have dealt with their difficulties.

The good news for you, the reader, is that you don’t have to run away to a plantation. Just read Celebration! and take Rachel’s journey with her. You see, Rachel’s journey is your journey–just as it is mine.

And yes! There is a solution to our sense of worthlessness. Rachel finds it. You will too!