Recovering Charles

by: Jason F. Wright

Published by: Shadow Mountain Publishers

Reviewed by Patty Inglish

Luke Millward is an astonishing photographer, but dates his best friend in what is a passionless relationship. His mother died in his youth, a year after descending into prescription-drug hell after an accident killed her own mother. Luke’s mom begged her husband Charles to take Luke and go make a real life somewhere – just leave her behind – but Charles refused. He stayed on as many codependents do, to doggedly to fight a battle he could not win, that of saving his spouse. Mrs. Millward committed suicide and Charles succumbed to alcoholism, losing his job and beginning to drift.

In this novel, Luke wants to believe that his father will recover. However, Charles calls every several months from a different city, needing more cash. His son always obliges, reluctantly, until the last straw. The son sends the father $500 and tells him not to call again. Then one day two years later, Luke receives a call from New Orleans call – Charles is lost in Hurricane Katrina! Shocked, Luke stalls and then finally makes the journey alone from New York City with his camera and laptop, wondering if he will find a recovered Charles or will need to officially recover and bury him.

What Luke recovers is his own passion for life. One of the first things he sees and snaps in New Orleans is a jazz funeral, the participants of which he meets along a three-day odyssey, but does not recognize. He later wins the Pulitzer Prize for the photo and remembers his parents’ love story. The members of the funeral parade teach him that Charles found recovery, gained a fiancé, saved lives, and taught children to play and write music while he made his own. His only wish for Luke was that he complete the second verse of a life for which Charles had written the first.

This story is well written with believable characters and a range of emotions reaching from numbness to love to rage and finally to hope.

Hurricane Katrina became the muse for this story that will move adults and teens with its theme song, “Love Me If You Can.”

Armchair Interviews says: A 5-star read!

Web sites:

http://www.JasonFWright.com

http://www.RecoveringCharles.com