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From My Heart

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Narcissa

Meet Narcissa: Chap1, Scene A

Meet Narcissa: Chap1, Scene A
by Brenda Wilbee
The day I met Dr. Whitman, a heavy bank of silver cloud threatened snowfall, pressing low over the house Father had built for us on the forest edge outside of Amity, Allegany County, Western New York State. A house similar to the one he'd built us in Prattsburg, where I'd grown up. He in fact used the same blueprints, giving a sensation of new—yet old and familiar. White clapboard. Green shutters. A narrow porch along the front. A house so new the floorboards had yet to complain. Indoors, fires crackled behind their hearths—parlor excepted. This was being cleaned. But on its mantle and throughout the house lamplight flickered a happy yellow. In the kitchen, heavy condensation beaded the muntins of Mother’s twelve-pane window positioned above the sink while my bread, divided into six loaf pans, fluffed under tea towels atop the cast iron stove. More than the regular baking had to be done today. Prayer concert was at our house tonight and all was a flurry. Dr. Whitman would be here.

I had mixed feelings about the affair...

An Unheard of Journey for a Woman

An Unheard of Journey for a Woman
by Brenda Wilbee

A LONG TIME AGO, "The Oregon" of North America’s mid-Pacific Coastline was a far-away region jointly accupied by England and America. England’s Hudson’s Bay Company had been there forever and over the years various American companies arrived, all vying for furs provided by native tribes. To The Oregon, then, is where Narcissa headed in 1836 to be a missionary, traveliing with her new husband and, unexpextedly, her old nemesis—bitter because Narcissa had once refused his hand. Awkward...

Narcissa Confronts Henry

Narcissa Confronts Henry
by Brenda Wilbee
A meeting with an agent last month changed the story arc of a love story that's been in my head for decades. I designed the cover so I have a visual of my characters and the world in which they lived the spring and summer of 1836. Here are my first 14 paragraphs of a new start on this true story of Narcissa Whitman.