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Songbirds and Stray Dogs by Meagan Lucas
In Songbirds and Stray Dogs, Jolene has been abandoned by her addict mother on the steps of her spinster aunt’s door. She’s spent the last thirteen years living in the shadow of the pain her mother caused and trying to prove herself worthy of her aunt’s stingy love. Unintentionally she becomes pregnant. When the father refuses her and her aunt kicks her out, Jolene tries to outrun her shame by heading to the mountains. It is a Southern story, but also a universal story of escaping a burdened past and finding yourself at home in a strange land.