Beyond the Blue [Paperback]

Two Worlds. Two Women. One Love.

In 1975, an American girl named Genevieve loses her mother when a plane full of orphans crashes in war-ravaged Vietnam. Miles away in the countryside, seven-year-old Lan, a Vietnamese girl, is forced out of her family home by her own brother who has joined the Viet Cong. Worlds apart, these two girls come into womanhood struggling to recover a sense of family–until their journeys suddenly converge.

Lan has grown up in the harsh realities of post-war Vietnam, but she yearns for a better life for her children. Meanwhile, Genevieve marries and, faced with infertility, decides to adopt a child from the country her own mother loved so deeply. But the uncertainty and risk of international adoption threatens to overwhelm both women before their hearts and their families can be healed.

Beyond the Blueis the story of enormous losses, unthinkable choices, and the transforming power of God's love for the children of the world.Leslie Gouldis the author ofGarden of Dreams.She works as an editor and writer in Portland, Oregon where she lives with her husband and four children.Chapter 1
Gen sat cross-legged on her bed, clenching her fist around the figurine of the Vietnamese girl, digging her fingernails into her palm. Tomorrow her mother would leave for Vietnam. Gen closed her eyes.
Bombs exploded. Jungles burned. The Viet Cong marched toward Saigon. Nhat cried–all alone–in the orphanage.
Her eyes flew open.
She hadn’t been afraid when her mother traveled to the country a year ago. But now Gen was older; now she was nine; now she knew to be frightened.
Where was Mom? Her mother tucked her into bed every night. What was taking her so long?
Gen opened her hand. The figurine’s dark eyes shone above her tiny nose and lifelike smile; carved braids framed her face. She wore a red tunic and pants and held a miniature wooden doll.
“Time forlS"