A Place to Land: A Story of Longing and Belonging

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Meeting a Memoir Author

We all long for belonging. When we read memoirs, intimate, personal stories that manage to feel universal, we often end up wishing to meet the author. I’ve often wished I could have a cup of coffee with Anna LeBaron or Anne Lamott. Now I can say that I HAVE met a published memoir author, and her book releases the first Tuesday of April.

I’ve ‘known’ Kate Motaung for three or four years through the Five-Minute Friday blogging crowd. I ‘met’ her through Twitter parties back when Lisa-Jo Baker ran the weekly prompt and link up. About three years ago, I cried through her short book Letters to Grief: Walking through Loss with Hope (Reflections on Dealing with Death and Other Losses).

In that book, I learned that Kate had lost her mother to cancer—a subject that fills my toes with lead. I lost my beloved Grandpa Strawn to cancer the summer between my junior and senior years of college. We found out that my husband had non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma on our daughter’s eighth birthday. Cancer creeps around poking his grimy genes into all sorts of vulnerable places.

Cancer lays claim to the title of ‘Equal Opportunity Disease’. It haunts young and old, black and white, male and female, rich and poor, gay or straight. A person’s heritage, race, language, skin color, immigration status, religious affiliation, or marital status make no difference to cancer.

Last summer, I had the privilege of attending the Five-Minute Friday retreat and meeting Kate in person. Her warm smile and soft-spoken ways hide a universal story of longing to belong that Kate tells with raw honesty and beauty.

A Universal Quest

Her quest for belonging began at the tender age of seven, when her parents divorced. The dual households created within her a disconnect—a feeling of belonging neither here, nor there. The sense of not knowing where (or what) to claim as home followed her through high school, college, and a move to South Africa for a stint in a mission field.

This memoir takes the reader over new roads with familiar signposts. As Kate shares her story, the reader will identify with her longing to belong. Readers will also appreciate the way she gently shares her faith. Kate invites the reader into her life and her story in an attempt to show how she found her place to belong.

Those seeking—whether they seek an answer to their questions about God, a way to find meaning in a loved-one’s cancer journey, or a deeper relationship with their Savior—will find hope and inspiration in this story. Kate’s word crafting will bring readers to tears. And leave them wishing they had an excuse to visit (and maybe even live) in Cape Town, South Africa.

If you preorder Kate’s book, you can enter to win a great package of prizes.

Once you’ve purchased A Place to Land, go to www.katemotaung.com/bookbonus to enter the contest.

Q4U: What’s the last good memoir you read?