Naked Mountain by Marcia Mabee
Published by She Writes Press on September 6th 2016
Genres: Biography & Autobiography, Death, Grief, Bereavement, Family & Relationships, General, Nature, Personal Memoirs
Pages: 304
Format: Paperback
Goodreads
This compelling memoir of one woman’s journey of enchantment, tragedy and romance unfolds against the backdrop of a stunning mountaintop in rural Virginia. Purchased on a lark for weekend camping by a clueless suburban couple, the mountain brings Marcia Mabee and her husband Tim surprising wildlife encounters, dramatic botanical discoveries, and a passion for conservation that leads to its dedication by the state as the Naked Mountain Natural Area Preserve. Naked Mountain veers in an unexpected direction when Marcia faces a life-threatening cancer diagnosis. Struggling with energy-sapping treatments, she continues to battle environmental threats to the beloved mountain where her ashes are to be spread. Just as her prognosis brightens, the story takes a darker turn, extinguishing the couple’s hopes for the future and throwing Marcia into the depths of despair. But in a surprising twist, she confronts the divergent forces of deep grief and new love to remake a life. Naked Mountain is an amazing personal journey that explores the joys of discovery, the uncertainties of life and the enduring bonds of marriage.
I’m currently on a memoir kick thanks to the BookSparks #MagicofMemoir Blog Tour! For a while there, all I seemed to read were memoirs and then something changed. Maybe I kind of got distracted or something, but I ended up jumping on the chick literature reading train for a solid year or so. Lucky for me, I’m getting reacquainted with memoirs, and the stories included in the #MagicofMemoir Blog Tour have been pretty amazing!
Naked Mountain: A Memoir by Marcia Mabee tells the story of Marcia and her husband, Tim, who want to escape their city life as a “power couple” in the Washington D.C. suburbs. Tim and Marcia decide to buy 200 acres of mountain land on a whim and build their life together. As they explore their new way of living life, Marcia unexpectedly learns she has ovarian cancer. She fights (and wins) her battle with cancer, only to learn that Tim has mere months to live due to his own cancer battle.
Naked Mountain is Marcia’s story of discovery, romance, heartbreak, healing and especially recovery. I loved how the author showed nature’s healing power in her life so vividly throughout the book. A gentle reminder of the power of nature. I also enjoyed seeing the city girl become a country girl thanks to a couple hundred acres of mountain!
Marcia Mabee is a retired Washington, DC “lobbyist.” After serving as professional staff for a committee of Congress, she represented nonprofit public health associations before the Executive Branch and Congress for twenty-five years. She holds multiple advanced degrees, including a PhD in health policy, an MPH, and an MSW. She has been published in The American Journal of Surgery and The Journal of the American College of Surgeons, and has written chapters for medical and nursing textbooks.
She currently writes a blog about living in the middle of the Naked Mountain Natural Area Preserve, a property she and her deceased husband, Timothy Bell, purchased in Virginia in 1988. An ovarian cancer survivor, she also writes about cancer and grief recovery. Naked Mountain is her first book.
I received a complimentary paperback copy of this book from BookSpark and the publisher as part of the #MagicofMemoir Tour!
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