The Peculiar Miracles of Antoinette Martin

Finished August 7
The Peculiar Miracles of Antoinette Martin by Stephanie Knipper

This novel begins with Rose Martin watching her young daughter Antoinette sleeping. She loves her deeply, but worries over her. We get the sense that something isn't right with the child. We next see ten-year-old Antoinette on her own, leaving the farmhouse to go out to the field of flowers beyond. We see that she responds to nature, but has difficulty moving, and is unable to talk. They live at the home that Rose and her sister Lily grew up on, at a farm near a small town called Redbud, in central Kentucky, near Lexington. The farm is a commercial flower farm.
Rose's sister Lily lives a couple of hours away in Covington, Kentucky, the north end of the state. She works for an insurance company there. Not far, but she hasn't talked to her sister in years, Not since shortly after their parents died, and Rose asked Lily to stay at the farm and help. Lily felt then that staying was a challenge that she wasn't up to, and Rose resented her for that decision. Both women have wanted to reach out many times since then, but neither has the courage.
So when Lily gets a call from Rose, once again asking her to come home, and tells her of her own failing health, Lily goes. She is still wary, afraid of the way she begins to act when she is around her young niece. She is very surprised to find that their neighbor, Seth, a man that Lily once thought she had a future with, is back in Redbud and working at the farm. Lily never really got over Seth, and thus the homecoming is even more emotional that she guessed. As she gets to know Antoinette, she finds that she can relate to the young girl, but when she discovers that Antoinette has healing powers of some sort, she is upset that neither her sister nor Seth has told her. As she learns more, she understands the situation better, and begins to find her place again there.
Lily's neighbor from Covington, Will, a young doctor who is a good friend, has followed Lily south, and shows up unexpectedly. Will has strong feelings for Lily, but also is a sensitive and observant man, and he begins to notice Antoinette's abilities fairly quickly. He also notices something else about them that no one else has, something that makes a big difference.
This is a story of love, of families, of how it feels to be "different," of the sacrifices that people will make for love. It is a story of a woman who comes to accept herself as she is, rather than fighting against her impulses. A story of two sisters who care deeply for each other.