Once in a Lifetime

Mary Monroe

Sep 2021 · Dafina

About this ebook

Beloved award-winning and New York Times bestselling author Mary Monroe delivers a hopeful and heartwarming story about an impossible Christmas dream, an unexpected act of goodwill—and a surprising chain of events that could gift joy far beyond the holiday season . . .
 
Free-spirited, living on the fly, Vanessa Hayes is still always down for traditional family holiday fun—until now. She’s making her oft-delayed wish finally come true: Christmas in Paris, the glittering City of Lights. But when her passport gets delayed, it's too late for Vanessa to rebook. Now it looks like the Yuletide she longs for won't happen. Until a stranger suddenly enters her life, and changes it forever . . .
 
Overwhelmed by responsibility, Judith Guthrie is too busy worrying about her seriously ill brother to have time to celebrate. She's taken a leave from her teaching job to care for him as he's on the waiting list for a life-giving transplant. A trip to France is a kind of happiness she can't imagine. But when she accidentally receives Vanessa's passport, Judith can't resist delivering it in person so Vanessa will at least have her holiday dream. She can’t anticipate that her small gesture will result in a series of big choices, big miracles, and lifelong rewards that all will be thankful for over many Christmases to come . . .
 

Ratings and reviews

Once In A Lifetime, by New York Times bestselling author, Mary Monroe is a book for the ages.I have spent the last two wonderful days reading my friend, Mary Monroe's beautiful story of love and God's incredible fate. The journey began when Vanessa was oh so excited to go to Paris and fate intervened. Her mother had been there before; her friends at work and family were excited; now it was Vanessa’s turn to go to Paris. Vanessa waited for her passport. Unfortunately, a few days before her trip, the passport did not come; and this made me feel bad for Vanessa. Vanessa went down to the travel agency. There, she was told she could apply for a new passport that probably would not get there in time for her well-planned trip. This was the moment, the second, and hour that God took the wheel. When God cooks he cooks up an everlasting love that can’t be denied. With her trip to Paris a thing of the past for Vanessa, one cold weekend morning, a lady named Judith Guthrie knocked on the door. She had received Vanessa's passport on Webb Street a few blocks over from Alice Street, which confused Vanessa. The lady was so nice God generated a very quick friendship between the two. In short order Vanessa learns Judith's brother is ill and needs a Kidney transplant. Later, after getting to know Judith better and how imposing her brother Ronald’s illness had been on her, I was so glad that Vanessa shared this first with her mother who lived with her husband in a senior home and I was very impressed that Odette, Vanessa's sister, was a smart, compassionate nurse. Turns out Vanessa's mother had a similar circumstance that she never told the family about when she was young and she told her Oldest daughter the first born about it first. When Vanessa's siblings, Gary and Debra heard about their mother's transplant, Vanessa had all the family's support to donate her kidney to Ronald. What I loved about this book is how the past can stay buried in the past until it’s relevancy can make a woman’s daughter do the right thing by a stranger who needed her kidney. This incredible story is a family book for the whole family. Vanessa was the kindest individual in this great novel and if we all set out to do things to help others not for what we might get in return, this would be an awesome world. From the family loans to her sister; to offering to pay for Judith's gas when she returned the passport. When you treat people well, greatness comes back to you. I loved the way Vanessa had no apprehension at all about being a donor to Ronald, who was having a horrible time with Jan, his former fiancé. All through this novel I was pulling for Vanessa, who was loved by her coworkers, especially her boss who was very accommodating to her needs. After the surgery the love God gives us when we wait on it arrived and despicable Homer, Vanessa's failed egotistical suitor was gone. I was thrilled and I was reminded that the loss of the passport gave one woman a love she’d not have found without that one mishap of life. There were many moments when I cried for Vanessa because in real life I just lost my play daughter whose name was Vanessa to breast cancer. Once again Mary Monroe, who never fails readers, has given me food for thought and a great story that will stay with me forevermore. Everybody should read Mary Monroe's Once in a Lifetime! CD Mitchell

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About the author

Mary Monroe is the award-winning and New York Times bestselling author of twenty-five novels and six novellas. She is a three-time AALBC bestseller and winner of the AAMBC Maya Angelou Lifetime Achievement Award, the PEN/Oakland Josephine Miles Award, and the J. California Cooper Memorial Award. The daughter of Alabama sharecroppers, she taught herself how to write before going on to become the first and only member of her family to finish high school. She lives in Oakland, California, and loves to hear from her readers via e-mail at [e-mail]. Visit Mary’s website at MaryMonroe.org.