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Kibler’s novel rotates among the stories of spitfire Lizzie, who has clawed her way out of the gutter to protect her daughter; fragile Mattie, who has lost her sickly child; and Cate, a modern-day librarian with her own tortured past who becomes obsessed with the Berachah story.

The Berachah Industrial Home for the Redemption of Erring Girls was a real-life Texas almshouse for “fallen” young ladies at the turn of the 20th century.

Kent Philpott and a few fellow seminarians at Golden Gate Baptist Seminary opened their own houses, Soul Inn and Berachah House, and those, in turn, produced other spinoffs.

Like the Israelites, they divide the year into four seasons, with the same festivals; they calculate by moons, and celebrate, as the Jews do, the berachah halebana, the blessing for the new moon.

Berachah gazed in amazement at Madelon and the roses which she held.