Just Thelma (Paperback)

Set in the 1930's on a farm in Minnesota, a young boy and an old man find sanctuary on top of the windmill and inside the cupola on the barn. A mother dies, leaving her teenaged daughter to keep house for a family of six adult men and one adopted infant. Three of her brothers marry, her uncle dies and the child is reclaimed by his natural father when he turns nineteen. She fills the void in her home with another kind of orphan, a runaway teenage girl. Complications from shattered relationships, new social ties and normal events of farm life create constant challenges. When all seems well, the catastrophe occurs. Through the screen of humor and pathos, ordinary people struggle to find that balance between themselves and their environment. Their actions are neither heroic nor tragic. Through joys and sorrows they seek fulfillment and find a sustained optimism.