On a warm May night in San Francisco, the Ritz-Carlton ballroom shimmers with crystal and silver as a glittering, celebrity-studded crowd gathers for a charity dinner dance. The evening is perfect - until, just minutes before midnight, the room begins to sway. Glass shatters. And as the lights go out, people begin to scream....

In the earthquake's aftermath, the lives of four strangers will converge.... Sarah Sloane, the beautiful wife of a financial whiz, watches her perfect world fall to pieces.... Grammy-winning singer Melanie Free, the event's headliner, comes to a turning point in her life and career.... Photographer Everett Carson, a former war correspondent whose personal demons have demoted him to covering society parties, finds new purpose amid the carnage...and Sister Maggie Kent, a nun who normally works in jeans and high-tops with the homeless, searches through the rubble - and knows instantly that there is much work to be done....

As the city staggers back to life, a chain reaction of extraordinary events will touch each of the survivors.... For Sarah, it begins with the discovery of a crime and a betrayal, then a strength she never knew she had. For Melanie, volunteering at a refugee camp will open new worlds of possibility. And Everett will be shaken by the unlikely relationship he forges with Maggie, who helps him rebuild his shattered life - and upends her own in the process. But as a year passes, and the anniversary of the earthquake approaches, more surprises are in store - as each discovers the unexpected gifts in a tragedy's wake...and the amazing grace of new beginnings.

Jonathan Kozol draws a vivid picture of an urban ghetto, with its hunger, poverty, drugs, disease and violence, through a series of interviews with the people of the Mott Haven section of the South Bronx, the poorest congressional district in the country. Dick Hill adds human voices as both the interviewer and the interviewees--the children, parents and ministers of Mott Haven. He skillfully captures the different voices, dialects and accents of the residents, differentiating between young and old, male and female. There is a sensitivity and calm in his performance that poignantly conveys the contradiction between the faith and optimism of the children and the "physically repellent and profoundly dangerous" conditions of their surroundings. These voices will stay with the listener for a long time. A.A.B. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine

 

Hundreds of people are attending a benefit at San Francisco's Ritz-Carlton Hotel when an earthquake occurs. Narrator Tom Dheere sidesteps a somewhat predictable plot with his portrayal of a small group of survivors as they come together at a shelter. They soon learn that the aftershocks in their personal lives will be more devastating than the quake itself. Dheere deftly carves out speech patterns for each of the main characters. Pop singer Melanie Free, from Southern California, has just the right amount of youth in her voice, which contrasts well with the older voices of Sarah and Seth Sloane, a well-to-do couple from Northern California. Photojournalist Everett Carson has a credible Montana drawl. Dheere's secondary characters are also well defined but restrained--so they don't overshadow the primary characters. G.O. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine

 

Danielle Steel has been hailed as one of the world's most popular authors, with over 570 million copies of her novels sold. Her many international bestsellers include Honor Thyself, Amazing Grace, Bungalow 2, Sisters, H.R.H., Coming Out, and other highly acclaimed novels. She is also the author of His Bright Light, the story of her son Nick Traina's life and death.

Amazing Grace by Danielle Steel
Continue Browsing		View My Wish List