Hotline Heaven

Sag Harbor, NY: The Permanent Press, 1998. First Edition [stated], presumed first printing. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. 157, [3] pages. DJ is in a plastic sleeve. Inscribed by the author on the half-title page. Inscription reads To Debbie--meet me in Hotline Heaven Frances Park 1/2/99. Frances is a gifted entrepreneur and scholar. She has written and published several books and successfully operates an acclaimed sweet shop in downtown D.C. called "Chocolate, Chocolate." From the author's website: I have published ten books in seven languages, beginning with the novel "When My Sister Was Cleopatra Moon". I'm happy to say that my shorter works - both fiction and nonfiction - have been published all over the place! In addition, with my sister Ginger, I've co-authored five highly praised children's books including "My Freedom Trip: A Child's Escape from North Korea", winner of The International Reading Association Award; "The Royal Bee", winner of The Joan B. Sugarman Award; and "Good-bye, 382 Shin Dang Dong", described by Newsweek magazine as "the perfect all-American story". I've been interviewed on ‘Good Morning America', CNN, the Diane Rehm Show, Voice of America, Radio Free Asia, and NPR. Derived from a Kirkus review: Debut detailing the lives of a middle-aged couple who meet via a suicide prevention hotline and continue to struggle against a nagging desire to end it all. Jo's woes began when her father committed suicide when Jo was only six and her mother wrapped herself in an impenetrable blanket of denial. Having cared for her mother until her death from cancer, then having moved into the basement of her married sister's home, Jo began the long march to age 40 as a self-loathing "old troll." That is, until she called the Hotline Heaven suicide prevention number and found Monk on the other phone. A divorced former stock-car racer still grieving over the death of his young son, Monk turns out to have a knack for relieving Jo's pain. The two arrange a meeting, fall in love at first sight, marry, and eventually settle down in tiny Canterbury, Pennsylvania. "Happily ever after" proves not to be a phrase in their emotional vocabularies, however: Even as Monk is promoted twice by his employer, a home improvement chain called Home-Mart, and even as Jo finds a satisfying creative outlet as baker at The Cake & Coffee, depression stalks them both. When Monk is fired from his job, he runs his car into a ditch; his near-death experience convinces him there's no life after death and therefore no reason for hope in this one. When The Cake & Coffee is singled out for a feature article in Hearthstone, the pressure on Jo to create a cake good enough to grace the magazine's cover takes the pleasure out of baking for her. Husband and wife suffer through this rough patch, empathetic yet too wounded to help each other. It takes a new job offer and a perfect cake to life their spirits, allowing these two aging lovers to stagger through another year.