Synopsis:
In a town called Daedalus Falls, it’s easy for the weight of wings to overwhelm. But in the summer of 1992, three generations of women in the Stanton family realize untapped strengths that give them the power to soar. As her aging mother falls prey to the ravages of dementia, Bonnie races to make sense of both her past and present, discovering that the truth of long-buried family secrets has the power to destroy—or to heal. Her niece Meg, meanwhile, is planning a wedding to the perfect man—and then watching fear and uncertainty pull them apart. Finally, teenage Jane, turning away from the burden of family history, comes of age in a way she never thought possible as she learns to care for an autistic boy. Ultimately, all three women discover grace and truth within themselves and their common bonds in this story of love and hope.

Summer Melody is a testament to how, in the face of tremendous challenges, family can bring us strength to survive, endure, and maybe even flourish.
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Excerpt:

And here they were again, eight days later, the start of a brand-new identical day. In the entire week, Charley had not said a word. Jane was starting to lose her mind from the quiet. As Charley lined up his cars, Jane picked up the Better Homes and Gardens magazine lying on the coffee table. She’d already leafed through it four times this week. She prayed that by some miracle, she’d find a story that she hadn’t already read, and that it might even be remotely interesting. She set it down after only a few pages, unable to work any magic to transform the newest recipes for asparagus into stories about something cool – maybe about people recovering from brain surgery. It would be so cool to be a brain surgeon. She didn’t even like asparagus – it made her pee green.

“Hey, Charley.” Jane tried to make herself sound enthusiastic.

He did not look up.

“C’mon, Charley, look at me.”

Still nothing.

Jane sighed. If she weren’t such a chicken, she’d quit today and find another job. It was depressing being so invisible. She scooted to the floor and tried rocking back and forth like Charley. It felt good, like being cradled in the ocean. Shoot, maybe she was a little autistic herself.

As she gazed at a spot on the wall, she realized something weird. There were no photos of Charley anywhere. No family pictures, period. She couldn’t remember ever being in a kid’s house where there weren’t school photographs or vacation pictures or something framed. At her home, Mom had a big collage that held all her school pictures, from first grade when Jane had actually been kind of cute in a serious-little-kid sort of way, all the way downhill to today. Irrefutable proof that she got dopier looking every year. But at least her mom was proud of her enough to put her face on the wall. It would be sad not to see yourself growing up in pictures, although Charley probably hadn’t noticed.

Jane crawled to Charley. The row of cars made a boundary line between them.

“Charley, ya gotta help me. I’m bored to tears.” Jane crossed her eyes, swooned and fell backward onto the carpet.

There was no response. Zip.

“Come on, I’m giving you my best material here!”

Sitting back up, she swiped her hair out of her eyes. Charley wasn’t looking at her at all. His cars were already in line, so now he began moving the car at the far end of the parking lot to the first spot. Then he re-aligned all the other cars.

This was infuriating. What could she do to make him notice her? Jane put her index finger on the Match-Box ambulance and moved it forward half an inch. “There. I messed up your perfect world. Deal.”

Charley immediately moved the ambulance back into position. His expression never changed.

Jane moved another car, this one a miniature red Corvette. Charley moved it back. Another car. And back. As Jane raised her hand and twirled her finger, scanning for her next target, she saw that Charley was looking at her, waiting. Not looking at her shirt, or even her finger, but at her face, for the first time. Jane brought her finger down until it almost touched the metallic blue convertible, then suddenly zipped her finger across the row and moved the black station wagon instead.

“Ha-ha!” she said. “Psych!”

Charley got up and left the living room.

Jane sat there, shaking her head. She’d actually thought he was enjoying this, as much as he’d enjoy anything. Stupid. She pushed herself off the carpet and started off down the hallway to look for him.

Charley emerged from his mother’s room holding a pair of matted, fuzzy lilac half-slippers, the ones missing the heel. He walked back to the living room, staring straight ahead. Jane followed behind him, and when she entered the living room, Charley took her hand and pulled her to the couch.

“Shoes off,” he said.

Jane was so astounded at hearing him speak that she forgot to listen to what he was saying. “What?”

“Shoes off.” Charley began to tug at the shoelaces on Jane’s stained and mud-spattered sneakers.

“Okay, okay! I get it!” Jane leaned over, untied her shoes, and slipped them off. “I hope my feet don’t stink.”

Charley placed the ratty slippers matter-of-factly over Jane’s toes. Then, apparently satisfied, he sat back down on the floor and began to re-align his cars.

Jane searched Charley’s face for anything that might indicate things had changed between them. But there was nothing. God, he was weird. And these slippers were at least a size too big. But at least he’d talked to her. That had to count for something.

At lunch, while Charley ate his peanut butter and jelly sandwich – cut on the diagonal – Jane tried to figure out how he looked different from other five-year-olds, how those boys would’ve known to pick on him. He was the same height as kids his age. He wore basic jeans and t-shirt, so his clothes didn’t set him apart. He wasn’t fat or too skinny. Maybe the hair. His haircut looked like his mom had put a bowl on top of his head, and while she cut around it, Charley kept moving. The edges were all uneven. But there was something besides the hair – something you couldn’t see – some kind of invisible force field that rearranged his molecules, so that everyone just knew he was way different.

Jane wondered if she might be giving off some of that same vibe. She always felt like she had a neon sign attached to her sweater that read “Socially Deficient.” She sat by herself at lunch. She wasn’t a jock, or a prep, or a brain, or a girly-girl type. She wore baggy jeans and sweatshirts, not khakis and polo shirts or jeans jumpers.

Lunchtime was the worst, because that was where the whole school saw that she didn’t have any friends. Jane usually brought her lunch specifically so she didn’t have to go through the lunch line. That way, she could pick an empty table and let it fill up around her, rather than have to find a seat amongst the assorted cliques. Other kids thought she was a brain, because she brought a book to lunch with her, but that was just so she wouldn’t look so pathetic, having no one to talk to.

Once, when she didn’t know any better, she’d wandered into the girls’ bathroom inhabited by all the punk smokers. The air was thick with nicotine and the smell of spearmint toothpaste. One of the girls – who was only a year older than Jane, but seemed like she was in her twenties – glanced at her from the mirror where she was reapplying stringy mascara. “What do you want,” she said, but not in a question sort of way.

Jane had a million answers – a life, a friend, someplace to belong – but she wasn’t about to say any of them. “I have to pee,” was all she said aloud.

“Go somewhere else.”

And Jane did.

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