Ever wonder what it would be like to walk through life in someone else's shoes?

Posted by Wodke Hawkinson on Monday, July 30, 2012 Under: Guest Posts

Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Quarter Finalist, The Boots My Mother Gave Me, is FREE on Kindle for today (July 30)!

Book description: Strong-willed tomboy Harley LeBeau puts you in the boots her mother gave her, as she takes you along her journey of escape from an abusive childhood and the desire to find herself as she comes of age. Made to feel a burden to her father simply by her gender, Harley is determined to prove her worth and independence, leaving the small town she grew up in and the one boy who gave her a soft place to fall, Jeremiah Johnson. Torn between saving herself and abandoning her mother and younger sister, Harley chooses her own life in hopes they will choose theirs, too.

A mature, candid read for everyone. A must for women. The Boots My Mother Gave Me explores the dynamics of abuse and dysfunction, the courage to overcome, the strength in sisterhood, and the ongoing conflict and unconditional love between mothers and daughters.

Climb into Charlene the Chevelle for a fast-paced story about a girl who is tough enough to survive and tender enough to learn to trust in love.

Excerpt:

I dug my boots, the one’s my mother gave me, out of the back of my closet and wore them that night, finally burying the hatchet. The guitar stayed; I remained unprepared to cross that bridge.

It felt surreal, wearing Mom’s shoes while dancing with her, the thing she and Dad used to do nearly every weekend in those very boots, while she carried me for nine months. My feet, a genetic mirror image of my father’s, pressed against the mold of my mother’s in the sole of her boot. It was ethereal.

Maybe in addition to my mental soul, could I have a physical soul after all, located in my feet? Sole or soul, could they be interchangeable? Reflexologists believe feet connect to everything in the body, and feet figure in spirituality, most often representing our walk through life, our journey.

These shoes embracing my feet had carried both of us, my mother and me, on the dance floor and in life. I thought of the irony of my mother’s life juxtaposed to my own, similar in some ways, polar opposites in others, yet we both walked in the same shoes, figuratively. All the times we disagreed on the way I chose to live my life, or the way she chose to live hers, one telling the other what she should do, what we would do, never understanding until we truly walked through life in each other’s shoes, literally.

I’m not sure who has the greater fear, mothers or daughters, that daughters will, in fact, become their mothers.

Author Bio: Brooklyn James is an author/singer/songwriter inspired by life in the Live Music Capital of Austin, Texas. Her first novel, The Boots My Mother Gave Me, has an original music soundtrack and was chosen as a Quarter Finalist in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards. Brooklyn holds an M.A. in Communication, and a B.S. in both Nursing and Animal Science. The Vigilare trilogy is an adaptation from a short narrative film. She is currently working on the last novel in the series, as well as another book and music soundtrack combination. All songs from the soundtracks are written/co-written and performed by the author.