Between Fires

“Between Fires is a wrenching, healing, grief-defying, awe-inspiring journey. Prepare for tears and laughter.” Marcia Orland, Afterglow Media The story begins in 1961, when the fierce Santa Ana winds hurled flames across the thirsty hillsides of Bel Air, on the west side of Los Angeles. A young woman ran with her two babies and a dog to escape the wildfire that burned her home to the ground. Eighteen days later, her husband died of a heart attack. What follows is a courageous story of dramatic choices—some foolish, some wise but all emotionally honest and inspiring. Marilee Zdenek’s seventh book offers a story that goes beyond surviving to creating an abundant life, drawing on her past to help define her choices for the future. What did she learn when she was twenty-one, living in Paris, acting in a film, trying to fall out of love with a complicated man who won her heart in spite of the warnings? How did she learn to love again, then lose again, then go on? The year is 2014. She has loved and lost two extraordinary men, endured the grief and faced the challenges. “Lessons I learned through dangerous choices and wise ones, lucky ones and embarrassing ones—were all a preparation for the important ones I must make in this season of my life. The species that doesn’t adapt, doesn’t survive and that’s true of widows, too. In fact it’s true of anyone who wants to make a meaningful life after devastating loses. “Now, as I turn eighty, I embrace the uncertainty that tomorrow holds and whisper my gratitude for all that remains.”