(photo by Artist Elizabeth Punches)

Behind The White Gate is a fictional novel about a woman who ran away from her home of Galveston Island sixteen years ago, her family, and what she was afraid she would become.  Even leaving and completely cutting off all contact with her beloved and close sisters.

She created an entire new life for herself in Los Angeles, California, building a career and married with years of happiness and steady life. Until that all changed. Suddenly, surprisingly unlike him, her husband becomes very abusive toward Bird. Bird, who never thought she’d be that woman, struggles with now standing in those shoes…until out of self defense, she shoots and kills her husband. The life she had created has shattered and she only knows one place to turn to, even if she doesn’t want to. That is home, the house she grew up in behind the white gate on an island which she approaches once again…and in begins to  face what she ran away from. She seeks answers to all of the things in her life that lead her to where she is now.

All that happened in her past year has led her to no longer be able to run from and ignore what happened through her entire childhood. She must confront those in her family, and those no longer with them. The men her father and her husband had been and the woman her mother was and is and learn for herself who she, Bird, is. Bird learns that running away is never the answer, even when sometimes not all questions can or ever will be answered. This it is a story of the adult living through childhood trauma. This is a story of tragic childhoods, family secrets and a childhoods understanding, running away from home and coming home again, domestic abuse and mental illness as well as suicide and abortion, seeking answers that don’t exist, and finding your path in life after the hurricanes. It is a story of relationships with her sisters. With her mother then and now. With her husband. With her father. And with herself.

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