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"Mama? Papa! Where are you?"

The child turned in all directions, searching, calling, but no one called back. The sun was setting, swiftly behind the tall pines, and a late afternoon chill signaled a cold, life-threatening December night, unless the child found shelter, soon.

Her long cotton dress, and tattered wool coat, would help, but her teeth were already chattering from cold, or maybe from fear. At this point, it didn't matter which. Both could spell her death.

Their attempted escape had begun the night before from the rural Georgia plantation; the only home the girl had ever known. That much she could remember. Then sometime, just before sunup, they'd heard the dogs. Vicious sounding, braying madly, having caught scent of fully focused prey—a family trying, desperately, to distance itself from the oncoming battle between the North and the South.

Annabelle had panicked and run in the opposite direction of the fearsome howling, believing her mother, father, and younger sister were heading in the same direction.

She was wrong.

Her voice, barely audible from strain, she stumbled through the thick undergrowth for hours, calling, "Mama? Papa? Where are you?" She slumped to the ground beside the trunk of a Georgia Pine, nestled her exhausted, frightened body into a pile of dry leaves and closed her eyes,


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All books by Mary Cunningham

Buried Treasure: The Adventures of Max and Maddie, was recently showcased on Reading Recommendations Blog, created by Susan M. Toy, author, publisher, and overall champion to writers of all genres.

So, I decided to do a little promoting for Susan! Here's a little about Susan and her "many hats."

About Susan Toy:

I  have been a bookseller, an award-winning publishing sales representative, a literacy teacher, and a promoter of fellow authors and their books through my company, Alberta Books Canada. I am also an author and publisher, under my imprint, IslandCatEditions.

Through Alberta Books Canada, I have represented authors directly, helping them find promotion for themselves and their books, seeking out new readers, and assisting them in making wise career decisions. I champion Alberta authors in particular, singing their praises throughout the province and online to the rest of the world, and I have displayed books for authors and publishers at Alberta library conferences.

I created the writing contest, Coffee Shop Author, have sat on the Board of Directors of the Fernie Writers' Conference, served as a member of the Calgary Distinguished Writers Program steering committee, and was a member of the board of directors for the Writers' Guild of Alberta.

I have made the decision to temporarily suspend operations of Alberta Books Canada in order to concentrate on my own writing and publishing, but my friends know this is just a cunning plan to spend several months at my home in the Caribbean, avoiding yet another Calgary winter ... I promise to return to Calgary in the spring with even more ideas on how to promote and market Alberta books.  Susan M. Toy

Also visit Susan's Blog, Books, Publishing, Reading, Writing.

Island in the Clouds: [Amazon] [Amazon CA]