Grief Biography

In the summer of 2000, David Hlavsa and his wife Lisa Holtby embarked on a pilgrimage. After trying for three years to conceive a child and suffering through the monthly cycle of hope and disappointment, they decided to walk the Camino de Santiago, a joint enterprise - and an act of faith - they hoped would strengthen their marriage and prepare them for parenthood.

In March 2017, Niamh Fitzpatrick’s life fell apart overnight. Her beloved sister, Dara, was killed in a helicopter crash. Soon afterwards, Niamh’s marriage ended, and she feared she would lose her home. Life as she knew it was gone forever, and the grief was overwhelming. A psychologist for many years, Niamh’s job is to help clients through the toughest times in their lives.

Parenting can be a struggle, especially parenting a disabled child. In this flawlessly crafted memoir, Kramar describes championing her son, diagnosed with Sotos syndrome, through his short life. She examines the experience of loving and losing a child and reminds us that there is a way forward through the grief. Kramar’s memoir offers guidance, wisdom, and inspiration - an amazing story of redemption and hope.

On August 15, 2014, I received a phone call that would forever change my life. My husband of 19 years, Larry, and only child, nine-year-old Landon, had just died in a plane crash. This is my survival story. I say survival because at times I thought I would die of a broken heart. Although this story is the raw, vulnerable truth of grief, my survival is anchored in hope and faith that was shaken to its core. God met me right where I was and walked with me on the most difficult and burdensome journey of my life. My prayer is that my story helps pave the path for others on this journey.

Close Enough to Perfect is the heartwarming and heartbreaking story of Chris and Al Noyes, married for 28 years until tragedy hit on a commercial airline flight. The story speaks of soul mates, happy places, mental illness, adventure, and sorrow. Christine Noyes has chosen to share a very personal and private journey with her audience, and this memoir does it in such a beautifully penned way that it feels like the listener is a party to the story from a very close friend indeed, told with deep emotion and a splash of bourbon.

When the Conley family lost both a husband and son to suicide, Carey and her daughter, Laurel, were blasted out of a comfortable reality. They struggled to cope with profound grief and the burden of the losses. Questions that could never be answered haunted them, and the tragedies forced a major shift in their lives.

It is an uncomfortable truth that the path to joy often leads through valleys shadowed by grief. Janna Barber was a preacher’s kid. She grew up surrounded by a cloud of believers that taught her to ignore and suppress such negative emotions. She graduated high school, went to college, found a husband, and started a family. That was when she found herself suffering through a profound sadness. Depression, multiple miscarriages, and an inexplicable anger weighed her down as she trudged through those shadows, searching for a light she could not find.

I lost my dad five years ago, and have been chronicling my journey from the start, from loss to grief to, unfortunately for me, depression. I've tried my absolute best to put my thoughts and feelings onto paper for this process, with the hope that someone, somewhere, can find value in it. It's been a tough old road; there's no denying that. And my search for a meaningful way forward has led me to writing this book. I hope it can help those who need it.

Life for Autumn Toelle-Jackson started out on a happy and ordinary timeline. When she entered her thirties, however, tragedy made up for lost time. Over the span of a few short years, she endured several miscarriages and the loss of her husband, a dear cousin, and child. But one small cross-section of a life doesn't do justice to the amount of love, resilience, growth, and blessings a person experiences after such titanic losses.

Truth, Huxley will learn, requires the loss of everything that keeps her from it. Starting over on a small farm on the plains of Kansas, she will find a vast wilderness to cross, one where beauty will triumph over defeat and love overcome death, where the colors of promise and eternity are unveiled, illuminating further each small step on the way to the ecstasy of understanding. It will be ridiculously hard at times. But there, she will be reminded of who she is and where she is going. We are not such as dreams are made of. But sometimes dreams can lead us home.