Joyce Shaughnessy

A Healing Place Joyce Shaughnessy

A Healing Place starts in the Dustbowl of the Great American Depression.  It describes in crucial detail the dust and the insect infestations that followed.  One of my reviews on Goodreads.com said he only bought it because he thought it was about the war, but he kept reading and "he could taste the dirt between his teeth."  The family finds a new home in Texon, Texas, an actual place where I lived as a little girl.  Then they were faced with WWII when the son-in-law is caught in the Philippines during the war.  Many people don't realize that they were bombed 9 hours after Pearl Harbor and were meant to do it at the same time, but the bad weather on Formosa delayed the attack.  The soldiers are forced to retreat to Bataan Peninsula and Corregidor, where they starve, get sick and run out of ammunition.  The U. S. is fighting Europe and at the time, the saying was "Hitler First."  They never received any aid from the U. S. for over three years.  Sick and emaciated they were forced to surrender and walk the infamous Death March, in which the Japanese slaughtered for entertainment, 12,500 men in a 64 mile walk.  Prayer becomes my soldier, Jed's healing place.  I hope you will try it out.  I have reviews on goodreads.com