Belonging is a recurring theme in my 35+ stories. I could point to one after the other and explain to you why the hero or heroine feels like an outsider in their own life. In some cases, that theme is fairly hidden. In others, it’s super obvious.
Take Kenna Johnson in Lavished with Lavender, which released recently. I’m not going to tell you about her childhood here (and spoil the story!) but suffice to say, she felt very alone, and for good reason. She made some bad decisions in her desire to belong somewhere, such as spontaneously marrying an alcoholic thirty years her senior. If you’re following along in the Urban Farm Fresh Romance series, you may remember her and Maurice Hamelin, and how she stuck by him for six years until his untimely death.
Makenna and Maurice were secondary characters in the fourth novel, Wishes on Wildflowers, but she stuck in my mind. What would make a woman choose someone like Maurice? Why would she stay? What would happen to her after his death?
And so, somehow, Kenna became the heroine of the ninth novel, Lavished with Lavender. I figured she deserved a happy ending, even though she held back, crossing her arms protectively as she assessed me. She did not want a happy ending, thank you very much. She wanted to be left alone where she could prove to herself that she deserved to be lonely. She figured that being a nurse was a good career. She could support herself and wouldn’t need anyone ever again.
She’d originally chosen nursing because she had the grades to get in. Nursing was a respectable career that would allow her to pay her own way. She wasn’t looking to get rich. She was only intending to stand on her own two feet.
That Maurice interlude? Makenna regrets that she somehow allowed her neediness to dictate her actions there for a while, but she’s no quitter. What she sets out to do, she does. Which also means not everyone likes her. She doesn’t mind that, unless it interferes with her pathway… and, of course, it does when she is passed over for better positions and shifts.
The Kenna who appears in the first chapter of Lavished with Lavender a couple of years after Maurice’s passing is single-minded. She needs this job — caring for Marietta Santoro as the elderly woman recovers from a fall that resulted in multiple broken bones. (As an aside, the fall and recovery mimics my mother-in-law’s experience several years ago…)
Inject prickly, single-minded Kenna into the Santoro family, where four of the old woman’s daughters-in-law are calling the shots and multiple adult grandchildren are involved. So. Many. People! But the most annoying one is the equally single-minded grandson, Tony, who’d opened an Italian restaurant nearby a few months ago.
While “opposites attract” is a fun romance trope that I’ve enjoyed writing on multiple occasions, in Lavished with Lavender, we find a heroine and a hero with the very same personality type. Both make snap decisions and follow through. Both are efficient and practical. Both may become impatient with others who don’t catch the vision quickly enough. Both are focused on their careers. This brought me as many inherent conflicts as any set of opposites could!
Kenna didn’t realize she was looking for belonging, for a sense of identity. She thought she was over all that. Even though she probably knew it was a basic human need, the risk of rejection didn’t feel worth it to her. She’d lose control, and she wouldn’t allow that to happen.
I found it rewarding to shepherd Kenna through her journey in Lavished with Lavender. She found faith in Jesus and a love in Tony, but it was a hard road through, and I’m pretty sure their relationship will have more trials in the future.
Can you identify with Kenna? Have you been hurt so deeply that it just doesn’t seem worth the effort to try one more time, because you know you will only be hurt again? Or maybe you know someone like that.
While Lavished with Lavender is 100% fiction, I truly believe that a flesh-and-blood person can find Jesus and, with Him, a deep sense of belonging!
A live-in nurse who can’t cook. A chef unable to provide care. And a convalescing grandmother determined to meddle.
Nursing the neighborhood matriarch through her convalescence from a nasty fall gives Makenna Johnson the break she needs from the head nurse on her ward. The family is plenty involved. Maybe too much so, since it includes a disapproving grandson who lives in Marietta’s basement.
If chef Tony Santoro weren’t so busy launching his new restaurant, he’d take on Nonna’s care himself, but it isn’t possible. If only the nurse was more obsessed with decent meals and less obsessed with polishing baseboards, he’d rest a lot easier.
How can two driven professionals who clash over Marietta’s care — and everything else — ease up enough to see each other’s hearts?
Buy or borrow Lavished with Lavender on Amazon!
Valerie Comer is a USA Today bestselling author and a two-time Word Award winner who writes where food meets faith and fiction. She injects experience laced with humor into her green clean romances. Her life on a small farm in western Canada provides the seed for stories of contemporary inspirational romance. Like many of her characters, Valerie and her family grow much of their own food and are active in the local foods movement as well as their church. She only hopes her creations enjoy their happily-ever-afters as much as she does hers, shared with her husband, adult kids, and adorable granddaughters.
We all want to belong. A reassuring theme.
This is probably why I love your books so much!!
Belonging is such a human need for all of us. Their story does sound entertaining :)
So true. ((Hug!))
Thank you!
Enjoy the read!
I can relate to Kenna, for sure. I struggled with friendships as a teen, and even when my kids were younger since I was the only person I knew with seven kids AND I homeschooled. Now that my kids are older and mostly gone, I have gotten used to not having female friends that are not only online friends that I either have never met or only get to see once a year at writing conferences.
I think everyone wants to belong, and it’s such a great theme! I love the phrase I found “my people.” I think it’s how we writers feel at writer’s conferences. :)
Great post! I rest assured that I belong to Christ. Sometimes I just feel cozy thinking about that.
Thanks
I’ve struggled with friendship all my life. It seemed that I was the only one (hello, “not-belonging!”) but now I believe most people struggle here. Most women, for sure. It’s such a weird thing to share universally.
Yes, I love when I feel I have found my tribe! A group of writers does pretty well for that…
Oh, Paula, I hear you. What would we do without being part of God’s family?!?
I also struggle with belonging sometimes. I know that I belong to Christ, which helps! However, it’s human nature to want to belong with others here. One place I know I belong is in the Ladies’ Bible Study at my church. I have some wonderful friends there!!
Oh, that’s awesome! I have moved so many times, both as a child with my parents and as an adult with my husband, that I can’t say I have a tight local circle of friends even now. Between living out of town, working from home, and being a total introvert… I haven’t put out the effort is the honest truth. Even now when we’re not going anywhere!
Such a universal theme. It gets worse with time I think. Very few of us live within community. Village life is a thing of the past and pretty rare. We are all individuals in our own little homes.
I know my neighbors well, thankfully, but some people never even meet their neighbors. It’s weird to be able to come and go with nobody knowing (caring ) and not leaving a mark.
Great book theme.
Such good points, Dalyn! Do you think people felt more belonging in centuries gone by when they spent their lives within a few miles of where they were born? Hmm.
I struggle with always feeling like I don’t fit in or I’m not good enough. Thank you for sharing. Blessings
Hugs, Lucy! I feel for and with you. :) And so does Kenna.
Oh yes, I’ve felt that way ! The deep hurt was caused by my very abusive ex-husband (and two bad relationships before that) years ago. I gave up on the idea of love & could life all on my own….sounds like Kenna doesn’t it? God had other plans! But it was hard to give my heart & open up again to a man, even one who I knew would never hurt me. The result? 23 years of blissful marriage definitely blessed by God! I could not be more happy :-)
I really want to read this series (or at least this book) because I bet I could really relate to Kenna. I have Kindle Unlimited so I’m going to be borrowing it to read when I am able to get to it (sooner than later)! Should I read about her & Maurice first, would it make better sense? And if so, which story would this be? Thanks Valerie! Your characters sounds like those I could really be friend with, root for and fall in love with myself!
I’m so glad you found the ability to trust again!
You can read Lavished with Lavender as a stand-alone, but it is distinctly book nine in a series, too. All of them are in KU, starting with Secrets of Sunbeams (or the first box set). Maurice and Kenna are secondary characters in the fourth book, Wishes on Wildflowers. Tony also has a fair amount of screentime in book seven, Dancing at Daybreak. But I do truly try to provide the relevant information within each book’s covers, so it can be read by itself if you wish.
Confused yet?!?! LOL
Your book sounds intriguing and like a very good page turner, I love the cover. I have felt like that but with my in laws. My husband is very sweet and very supportive . I know I am enough, and glad that we have not lived close to them for a long time. My husband calls them once a week so that is good and that makes me happy, he is pretty close to them. When my mom and my dad passed away, they didn’t tell me anything, but that’s o.k. as long as my husband is and stays close with them is good enough for me. God knows I tried and that gives me peace.
In-laws can be a really tricky relationship. I hear you there!
Belonging. Yeah, right up there with food and respect. You can survive without it for some period of time but life gets very hard until something gets fixed. Been there, done that. More times than I’d like to think about.
Belonging. It brings up really challenging situations, like being a man, commenting on a blog dedicated to Inspirational Romance. Hmmm.
Ah, but a man dedicated to romance God’s way? You belong!
Aww, thank you. :)