Pen Pal Feathers

Book excerpt: “These letters reveal how I remembered I had wings, and that I could fly – not because I had them, but because I had the courage to use them.” The ageing Arabella Gallina is struggling to pack up her family’s centuries-old coffee plantation house in Costa Rica. Receiving a visit from her son James, she discovers that his daughter, Isabella, is facing challenges in far-away England. Reluctantly at first, Arabella begins a correspondence with her granddaughter that eventually allows them both to make sense of the inevitable pain that life delivers to us all. Pen Pal Feathers is the multigenerational story of a remarkable family, a magic realism narrative that winds through Europe and the Americas and encompasses the full sweep of the 20th century. It reveals the powerful bonds between generations and how those bonds shape our lives – how enduring familial love can supply the wings that enable us to fly.