When Denise realizes that an ancient curse hangs over Ben's family line, she begins to understand that her destiny is interwoven with Ben's.
After the loss of her fiance, Denise Higgins, a young Jamaican American college student, has fallen on hard times. Struggling with grief, her impoverished life, and a needy family, she accepts an opportunity as a sober companion. Her job is simple: keep Ben Moreau away from drugs and report back to his parents. But then she meets him. And Ben Moreau, despite being three years her junior, proves to be far more alluring than she ever thought possible. Not only is he a gorgeous and wealthy French Korean with an ever so charming personality, he is also generous and willing to befriend her so long as he can have her loyalty. Following her heart may only bring her grief, and ignoring it is certain to.
Denise Higgins a college student and lover of languages is still reeling from the death of her fiancé, a chaplain in the army, when she is introduced to Ben Moreau, a French-Korean nineteen year old three years her junior.
Unlike Denise who is a staunch Bible reader and a seer of visions, Ben is a jaded profligate surrounded by drug-taking friends. When Denise is hired to be Ben's sober companion, she has a few hurdles to overcome. Least of which are Ben's money, Ben's ability to manipulate her, and her own growing infatuation with him.
Onion is a bittersweet story that follows the spiritual development of cynical but sensitive Denise and contemplative but loving Ben. Their backgrounds could not be more different, both in culture and background as his wealthy Korean and French proprieties conflict with her poor Jamaican Christian upbringing.
The prejudices of the well-to-do, of Christian parents, atheist parents, and pagan friends also work against Denise, even as she challenges their expectations and what she believes about herself.
But Ben, with his sweet wit and selfish but kind heart, challenges her expectations as well. Together, they grow to discover a fuller and richer life.
Excerpt
Silent treatments were my sister’s primary weapon of choice. She had the gift of spite, and could spitefully keep silence going for a good three weeks or more. Her silent treatments could bring our entire household to its knees. Once she kept it up for a month. After she deigned to speak to us again, things were never the same between us and her. I was never sure if she regretted that, or even noticed it.
Ben and I were locked in silence. I reassured myself that silent treatments were only effective if the silent person knows that the object of his silence loved him. After all, no one else would give a damn. That’s why I’d never engaged in silent treatments. I was never one to exercise spite or power. I’d be too afraid of the backlash. What if it turned out I wasn’t loved enough for anyone to care if I used the weapon effectively?
So the flip side of the silent treatment was the knowledge that Ben knew I loved him and that I was being hurt by his silence. Still, it was evident that silent treatments were new to him. Compared to my sister’s more skillful achievements in that particular art form —including her four-week triumphant three-in-one silent treatment against everyone in the family except Hemo— Ben’s attempt was weak, unsustained, amateurish. He’d fade in and out of his commitment to detachment, depending on how attractive the conversation. Then he’d remember that he wasn’t talking to me and return to silent mode.
Still, he managed some kind of consistency. At one point, I was about to burst from anger and I shouted at him with tears in my eyes, “Speak to me!” Three little words that almost — just almost— made him falter. For a moment shame and compassion flickered in his eyes. He seemed on the verge of dropping the silence and actually forgiving me. But no, he recouped! Despite my quivering in front of him like a desperate bowl of jelly pleading not to be eaten or swallowed up, a sudden infusion of strength and anger came out of nowhere and he managed to hold onto his spite. He walked past my trembling mass as if I wasn’t there.
A young widow joins her aunt’s house-restoration project in the wilderness, determined to take a stand for independence, but two men have different plans for her—and so does God.
Crystal Reed thought she had met the perfect man. Instead she finds herself entangled in a web of obsessive love and dark secrets, a world that has become tainted by deception and treachery.
