Belonging--the first novel by Jill Fordyce--is a tenderly drawn coming-of-age story that sympathetically traverses decades in the life of one soul-searching woman from Bakersfield, Calif., and how generational influences shape her fate.

The story begins in December 1977--a time filled with wood-paneled station wagons, the music of Merle Haggard and Carole King, and movies like The Goodbye Girl, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and Saturday Night Fever. Jenny Hayes is 13 years old, a "shy and slow to make friends" eighth-grader fascinated by photography and smitten with Billy Ambler--"his broad shoulders, the dark curls that touched the top of his perfect ears, the way he held his camera like he knew what he was doing." Jenny's best friend is Henry, the "boldest and funniest person" she had ever known. The two bonded in kindergarten and became "unlikely but inseparable" friends. Henry's parents broke up when he and Jenny were in the fifth grade, and he is privy to Jenny's home life--the erratic, neglectful, and emotionally abusive nature of her alcoholic mother, Janice. Henry knows "the crushing level of cruelty" of which Jenny's mother is capable, and how her father--amiable, but often absent--works long hours as a produce broker to escape Janice's wrath.

Jenny's saving grace--in addition to her friendship with Henry--is her extended family on her mother's side. The Morettis, who also reside in Bakersfield, are vivacious, loving, and spiritually bolstered by their Catholic faith. The supportive presence of her widowed Nonna and Uncle Gino--Nonna's youngest brother, also widowed, who runs a local antiques shop--brings happiness and much-needed stability to Jenny's life. She often works at the store and is always intrigued when Gino and Nonna regale her with stories of the Moretti family's migration from Italy in 1902, and how they came to put down roots in California.

Shortly before Christmas, a terrible dust storm sweeps the San Joaquin Valley. Eleven days later, Jenny wakes to find itchy red welts covering her body. She has contracted valley fever, an illness caused by fungus spores stirred up in the wind that enter the lungs and develop into a pneumonia-like infection. Jenny's damaged right lung keeps her out of school for months. Throughout her long, harrowing medical ordeal, Jenny's mother and Nonna care for her daily. Janice and Nonna share a "tenuous and bitter" relationship, as Janice became pregnant with Jenny when she was only 19; she eloped, and Jenny was born six months later.

During her prolonged isolation, Jenny draws from the spiritual faith of Nonna and Uncle Gino. Catholic statues and religious icons that Jenny discovers at Uncle Gino's shop become sacred touchstones; they bring comfort on her long road to healing. And a collection of prayer cards with religious art depicting the lives of the saints takes on greater meaning when an unexpected death profoundly impacts Jenny's young, still malleable life.

When Jenny returns to school months later, she reconnects with Billy Ambler, who is now an aspiring pitcher. The two join forces, taking pictures for their photography course, and romance blooms. For the next several years of high school, Jenny and Billy's passionate young love grows--a love that, in some ways, liberates Jenny from the prickly relationship with her mother, who is clearly jealous of her daughter's happiness. At every turn, Janice passes judgment, calling  Jenny "trashy" and "floozy," among other slurs. Janice also degrades Henry, describing him as a "freak." These slanders deepen the mother-daughter divide, and Jenny applies to college to escape her mother. Through it all, Jenny conceals her mother's alcoholism from Billy, who doesn't fully accept Jenny's enduring, however changing, friendship with Henry.

At the end of senior year, Jenny and Henry set off to study at USC, while Billy gets a baseball scholarship to Arizona State. Jenny and Billy make a heartfelt, romantic vow: in seven years, after they launch their adult lives, they will get married. But surprising twists and turns, choices made, challenge them and change both Henry's and their lives.

Readers dip in and out of dramatic episodes from Jenny's life. Fordyce crafts perceptive scenes that depict Jenny's maturation, illustrating how the past influences her ability to love and trust. The path she travels rarely goes according to plan. Jenny, and those who come to define her life, are tested, forced to face hard truths--even truths about themselves. Can wounds from the past ever truly heal? Is forgiveness possible? And what will it take for Jenny to carve out her own unique place in the world so she can finally experience a true sense of belonging?

Multi-layered characterizations, spiritual undertones, and emotionally evocative scenes propel this searching, inspiring story that explores themes of trust and loyalty; secrets and truth-telling; the meaning of love; and the many challenges posed in living a truly authentic life. With prodigious insight and great delicacy, Fordyce intimately explores ideas of family in its many forms--how family can both empower and damage--while also probing the battles between the head and the heart in matters of love and acceptance. --Kathleen Gerard

(photo: Nathan Westerfield)

Jill Fordyce was born and raised in Bakersfield, Calif. She received a degree in English from the University of Southern California, and a law degree from Santa Clara University. While practicing law, she continued to study writing through the Stanford Continuing Education creative writing program. Her first novel, Belonging (Post Hill Press, January 30, 2024), traces the relationships and generational influences that impact the life of one woman over the course of 40 years.

Why write a coming-of-age story?

I have always been moved by stories that chronicle of young love, lifelong friendships, hometowns, music, and the hold the past often has over the present. And when I think of important times of youth, for me they are set against the backdrop of the Central Valley of California.

That accounts for the Bakersfield setting.

Initially, I thought of setting the novel in a fictional town, but every time I traveled back to Bakersfield, I felt such a unique type of inspiration, and I knew I had to write about it. I think we write what we know, what we can see--particularly with a first novel. The setting is so important, and Bakersfield is a place I know personally, so it made sense to put Jenny (the main character) there.

Themes of "hometown" are central to the story.

While some inspiration may come from what the notion of "hometown" evokes for everyone, some of it feels very specific to Bakersfield and Central California--the music, the food, the tree-lined streets and flat horizon, the warmth and the fog, the families who have known each other for generations.

Yes, the importance and influence of family--both birth and created families--is threaded throughout, as are themes of life and death, and a reliance on spiritual faith.

Family to me is a place of home and belonging. And belonging is fundamentally about the undoing of aloneness, which is a primary need for everyone. As I came to understand Jenny more deeply, I could see that her faith--Catholic faith instilled by her extended family--was central to her life. The comfort she derived from those spiritual influences was critical to her survival as a child, as she undergoes illness, isolation, and experiences death for the first time. Jenny comes to believe that to "love forever is to live forever." If she didn't have a spiritual grounding and hold such belief, I don't know if she would have had the fortitude and resilience that she does. She knows she's not doing it all alone. 

The book offers an ensemble cast. Yet, you tell the story solely through the perspective of a sensitive woman whose life is traced over decades.

All of the characters exist relative to Jenny, and I wanted to convey her experience of growing up in an intimate and realistic way--especially in a home with an alcoholic mother. I wanted to show those things that a young girl would rely on when her home life is so tumultuous: friends, extended family, faith, music. Finally, I wanted to understand how she would emerge from it and create the life that she longed for--and those things are possible primarily due to the large circle of loved ones around her.

The enduring battle of alcoholism figures prominently.

I don't know the percentage of families affected by alcoholism, but I suspect it is very high. Jenny learns that you can love and forgive an alcoholic on your own yet, also, step away and live your own life. Even if the alcoholic is never better, is never able to see her way out of the disease, the people around her can find grace and peace, both for themselves and the alcoholic. I think adult children of alcoholics have a unique burden when trying to find trusting love relationships and, in exploring Jenny's relationships, I try to show how some of those difficulties can be overcome.

How difficult was it to tell this story?

The most fulfilling part was experiencing the story as it unfolded, when it wasn't struggle or effort, when storylines emerged without conscious thought. That felt like magic. However, Belonging took me over 10 years to conceive of, write, and market. I embarked on many rewrites. When I first sat down to write, the only concrete idea I really had was the notion of the bonds of childhood friendship that light the way throughout life, across time and distance--and even death. 

The book spans from 1977 to 2017. Why that timeline?

I love a complete and full story--of seeing characters as children and then as young adults on their own in the world... and then in middle age, in a place where they can look back. The seeds of early relationships are so important. I always want to know, if characters are in love, why are they in love? If characters are best friends, why are they best friends? I tried to show readers the strength--and lasting impact--of childhood bonds, what they bring out in people.

Detailed flourishes and nostalgia are embedded throughout the novel. How much research was necessary? 

I researched the climate and geography of Bakersfield and the surrounding area: why there is fog, why the river was dry, the origin of the Grapevine, the ramifications of valley fever, a fungal disease. I delved into the history of Bakersfield and the Bakersfield Sound. I spent time in antique stores and looked at religious prayer cards. I rewatched films that inspired me. I listened to many old songs and made sure they were chronologically correct. I re-read both Our Town (Thornton Wilder) and The Greatest Thing in the World (Henry Drummond) several times. I spoke with a hospice nurse about end-of-life care. I spent hours researching the Vietnam War. But there were moments, too, when no research was necessary--gifts were just presented to me.

Belonging is certainly a gift to readers! Any plans for a second novel?

Yes, I am so excited to be working on another coming-of-age love story and family story, this time set in rural Tennessee. --Kathleen Gerard