Salvaging the Heart: Chromium Angel (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780228830344)

WHAT IS THE CHROMIUM ANGEL?

When Grace and Harry were out on a photo shoot, Grace stumbled across a 'natural sculpture' by a shade tree in the middle of the pasture. At first, it appeared to be the mangled wreck of a car, but on closer investigation, the out-of-control vehicle (implacable force) had collided with a tree (immovable object) and crumpled the chrome fender into the upward-surging form of an Angel, with its up-swept wings clasped together in an attitude of prayer. When the sun glanced off the tip of those wings, it created a sparkling star. Grace wrote a poem about it. She was convinced that it was praying for the souls of all those who had lost their lives in road accidents, but the Chromium Angel offers a challenge of a different sort...

WHAT IS ITS CHALLENGE?

'To take that which is broken and distorted in one's life, and create something that is beautiful and inspiring.'

WHO WILL RISE TO THAT CHALLENGE?

'Love is just around the corner'. The words of the newspaper horoscope hit Grace Winston, a writer of romantic fiction, right between the eyes. She thought that if she knew which corner, she could avoid it. Grace, at forty-two, had yet to write a happy ending for her own love story. Still, there was always hope. Grace's Toronto lifestyle was tumbling around her ears like that crumbling old fire-trap she called home. Fear for her future looms large.

Harry Grant is a widowed photographer, a little younger than Grace, father to teenage twins. He makes his home just outside of Guelph, and although successful in his work, Harry has lost control of his life, and he spends much of his time in his darkroom to escape the crawling chaos of his home-front. In fact, 'dark room' is an apt metaphor for Harry's life.

Harry is in Toronto, visiting his mother, when he and Grace meet under mysterious circumstances, and try to begin a relationship. However, as if getting in sync with the whimsical and erratic Grace isn't challenging enough, trouble stalks at home. When Harry's tragic wife, Elinor, was on her deathbed, she extracted a promise from him, which he had failed to fulfill. That was three years ago. Now it's coming back to threaten his relationship with the twins. Harry turns to Grace for advice and support while he tries to do some damage control. He begins to see the real possibilities of this relationship, if they can ever get it off the ground, that is.

A fire in Grace's Toronto apartment building leaves her with nowhere to go, and soon she finds herself caught up in the trauma and drama of Harry's crazy household. Two angst-ridden teenagers, a house that resembles a crash-site and a chain-smoking ghost isn't exactly the stuff that Grace's romantic dreams are made of. Still, there is Harry. For him, she would brave all this, and more.

Are Harry and Grace up to the challenge of the 'Chromium Angel'? Can they take that which is broken and distorted in their lives, and create something that is beautiful and inspiring? I invite you to find out.