Autumn Dreams

They call it the "sandwich generation." Daughter, sister, auntie, innkeeper, employer-but has Cass herself gotten lost in the crunch?

The proud proprietor of her own bed-and-breakfast in sleepy Seaside, New Jersey, Cass Merton is intrigued by Dan Harmon who arrives at SeaSong for an extended stay. After witnessing the collapse of the Twin Towers in New York City, the godly finance specialist is rethinking his life, career, and relationships-or lack of them. God, Dan laments, I can't do this! Forty-four is too old to have no plan for the future!

Whatever possessed me to think I could do this? Cass asks, questioning her consent to care for her easygoing nephew and feisty teenage niece for a whole year while their parents work in the Middle East. Add Cass's four brothers, who don't take Dad's compulsive contest entries and Mom's increasing dementia one bit seriously, and her emotions swirl like the quickly rising hurricane that's fast approaching Seaside. But everyday cares aren't Cass's only problems. A troubled young employee unknowingly endangers her as well. When an alarm sounds in the middle of the night, bullets fly and Cass is taken hostage by a gunman. Dan looks urgently to the Lord for help and recognizes a new emotion within himself: love.