Letters Never Sent

Overview

Three women, united by love and kinship, struggle to conform to the social norms of the times in which they lived.In 1931, Katherine Henderson leaves behind her small town in Kansas and the marriage proposal of a local boy to live on her own and work at the Sears & Roebuck glove counter in Chicago. There she meets Annie—a bold, outspoken feminist who challenges Katherine’s idea of who she thinks she is and what she thinks she wants in life.In 1997, Katherine’s daughter, Joan, travels to Lawrence, Kansas, to clean out her estranged mother’s house. Hidden away in an old suitcase, she finds a wooden box containing trinkets and a packet of sealed letters to a person identified only by a first initial.Joan reads the unsent letters and discovers a woman completely different from the aloof and unyielding mother of her youth–a woman who had loved deeply and lost that love to circumstances beyond her control. Now she just has to find the strength to use the healing power of empathy and forgiveness to live the life she’s always wanted to live.

Reviews

"The story unfolds like a flower; the impact of it on each person is profound. It's a spectacular offering of love gained, lost, and struggled with over a lifetime—a poignant tale with a marvelous reveal at the end." —Anna Furtado, Lambda Literary Review

"The characters are well developed and the story is beautiful. This story will take you on an emotional rollercoaster, that will make you beg for more books by this author. I would be happy to read this book over and over again. Letters Never Sent should be a bestseller." —Heather Bennett, Curve Magazine

"Letters Never Sent is a crisp, well-written story that is chock full of strong imagery, indelible characters, and conflict that almost any woman can relate to in one way or another. Her transitions between the past and present work seamlessly, and she is able to capture the floodwaters of joy, love, heartbreak, and sorrow with unhurried profundity." —Salem West, The Rainbow Reader

"Moran's building of this struggle is well-handled and one of the strengths of the novel, for at several points she could have easily dipped into stereotypes and sugar-coated this journey. She doesn't, and that's what makes this such an important read for anyone seeking a sense of how difficult life was like for lesbians (specifically) and perhaps any member of the LGBT community trying to establish a life for oneself." —Brad Windhauser, Queer Books

Author Biography

Sandra Moran was an author and assistant adjunct professor of anthropology at Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, Kansas. A native Kansan, she had worked professionally as a newspaper journalist, a political speech writer, and an archaeological tour manager. In her novels, she strove to create flawed characters struggling to find themselves within the cultural constructs of gender, religion, and sexuality. Despite being an avid marathon/ultra marathon runner, gym rat, and living healthy, she lost her battle to an aggressive cancer in November 2015, just weeks shy of her forty-seventh birthday.