Heaven in a Wildflower by Cynthia Mines 978-1-972231-05-0 (hard cover) 978-1-972231-01-2 (paperback) 978-1-972231-04-3 (ebook) 978-1-972231-06-7 (audio) FICTION / Historical / General FICTION / Coming of Age FICTION / Small Town & Rural
Heaven in a Wildflower, a novel by Cynthia Mines, is the story of Kristin Thorsen, who is forced to grow up in a lonely prairie parsonage in central Kansas with her father as the Great War rages in Europe. Twenty years later, when her husband leaves for World War II, Kristin returns to the prairie to explore her past and write down memories to pass on to her daughter.
Set among fields of emerald-green winter wheat, the coming-of-age story takes on Oz overtones when Kristin is befriended by a neighbor widow and a local seed merchant on a journey to trust her heart and summon the courage to explore beyond the vast horizon. She leaves the prairie for Kansas City where she is hired as a Harvey Girl at Union Station in the early 1920s.
“(The author) has thoughtfully and lovingly distilled Kansas history into a page-turning novel,” wrote Ted Ayres, producer/host of “Inside the Cover,” a PBS Kansas program, in an advance review. “This coming-of-age story will educate, inform, and entertain readers of all ages.”
For more than four decades, Mines has researched Kansas history through roles as publisher-editor of Travel Kansas magazine for 32 years, as a reporter for the Wichita Business Journal, and as the author of the nonfiction book, For the Sake of Art: The Story of a Kansas Renaissance, which was named a Kansas Notable Book in 2016. Her articles have appeared in dozens of publications, including the Los Angeles Times. This is her first novel.
Mines turned to fiction to tell Kansas stories because she believed a historical novel might reach more readers than a nonfiction book. “Kansas has such a rich and varied history, I wanted as many people as possible to know what life was like on the prairie,” she said. “This also seemed an especially important time to preserve and amplify the significant role immigrants played in building the state.”
She added that another goal was to try and “capture the essence and enigma that is Kansas, a state that has produced President Dwight D. Eisenhower, aviatrix Amelia Earhart, and Pulitzer Prize-winning writers William Allen White and William Inge. Interestingly, these brilliant and inspiring Kansans did not hail from the state’s larger cities--they were shaped by their hometowns of Abilene, Atchison, Emporia, and Independence.”
The 360-page book is available in hard cover ($38), paperback ($25), ebook ($12) and audiobook narrated by Marsha Hoover ($16) wherever books are sold. The book has been certified free of AI by the Authors Guild.
Meadowlark Press, established in Emporia in 2014, publishes novels, memoirs, poetry and children’s books with a focus on Midwestern settings and authors. Meadowlark Press also awards the annual Birdy Prize to the best full-length collection of poetry nationwide.
Set among fields of emerald-green winter wheat, the coming-of-age story takes on Oz overtones when Kristin is befriended by a neighbor widow and a local seed merchant on a journey to trust her heart and summon the courage to explore beyond the vast horizon. She leaves the prairie for Kansas City where she is hired as a Harvey Girl at Union Station in the early 1920s.
“(The author) has thoughtfully and lovingly distilled Kansas history into a page-turning novel,” wrote Ted Ayres, producer/host of “Inside the Cover,” a PBS Kansas program, in an advance review. “This coming-of-age story will educate, inform, and entertain readers of all ages.”
For more than four decades, Mines has researched Kansas history through roles as publisher-editor of Travel Kansas magazine for 32 years, as a reporter for the Wichita Business Journal, and as the author of the nonfiction book, For the Sake of Art: The Story of a Kansas Renaissance, which was named a Kansas Notable Book in 2016. Her articles have appeared in dozens of publications, including the Los Angeles Times. This is her first novel.
Mines turned to fiction to tell Kansas stories because she believed a historical novel might reach more readers than a nonfiction book. “Kansas has such a rich and varied history, I wanted as many people as possible to know what life was like on the prairie,” she said. “This also seemed an especially important time to preserve and amplify the significant role immigrants played in building the state.”
She added that another goal was to try and “capture the essence and enigma that is Kansas, a state that has produced President Dwight D. Eisenhower, aviatrix Amelia Earhart, and Pulitzer Prize-winning writers William Allen White and William Inge. Interestingly, these brilliant and inspiring Kansans did not hail from the state’s larger cities--they were shaped by their hometowns of Abilene, Atchison, Emporia, and Independence.”
The 360-page book is available in hard cover ($38), paperback ($25), ebook ($12) and audiobook narrated by Marsha Hoover ($16) wherever books are sold. The book has been certified free of AI by the Authors Guild.
Meadowlark Press, established in Emporia in 2014, publishes novels, memoirs, poetry and children’s books with a focus on Midwestern settings and authors. Meadowlark Press also awards the annual Birdy Prize to the best full-length collection of poetry nationwide.
An award-winning writer, Cynthia Mines published The Wichita Times and Travel Kansas magazine for more than thirty years. Her articles have appeared in dozens of publications, including travel articles in the Los Angeles Times. Her book, For the Sake of Art: The Story of a Kansas Renaissance, was named a Kansas Notable Book in 2016. She is the author of two other books on Kansas history as well as numerous articles and chapters. This is her first novel.
A graduate of McPherson College, she earned a master’s degree in English from Wichita State University. She lives with her husband, Toby, and dog, Ozzie, on the prairie in central Kansas.
A graduate of McPherson College, she earned a master’s degree in English from Wichita State University. She lives with her husband, Toby, and dog, Ozzie, on the prairie in central Kansas.
RSS Feed