An Emotional Story of Love and Healing
The Epicenter of Forever
Women's Domestic Life Fiction, Contemporary Women Fiction, Contemporary Romance
Lake Union Publishing
February 1, 2026
Ebook, Paperback, Audiobook
303
A moving story about family, forgiveness, and unexpected love—where the fault lines of a fractured past become the foundation for building something new.
Eden Hawthorne spent idyllic childhood summers in Grand Trees, a mountain town perched along a restless earthquake fault in the heart of California’s fire country. But her family and future were shattered there, and she vowed never to return—until news of her estranged mother’s illness forces her back twenty years later.
Still reeling from her recent divorce, Eden has to confront her mom’s found family, including single father Caleb Connell, who blames Eden for the seismic rift that drove her away. But as they move beyond a battle of wills, Eden and Caleb discover shared wounds and intertwined histories—and succumb to an attraction that feels fated.
When her mother’s condition worsens, Eden faces an impossible choice between the man she’s falling for and the mother she’s just beginning to forgive. And with time running out, Eden fears her decision will doom her to relive the aftershocks of past heartbreak.
“You gotta fill your life with things you love more than you loved what broke you.”
Mara Williams’s new release, The Epicenter of Forever, is a beautiful, emotional story. It is a romance, yes, and the relationship between Eden and Caleb was absolutely heartwarming (more on that later). Yet what really brought tears to my eyes in this novel was Eden’s fractured relationship with her parents–especially her mother–and their exploration of healing and forgiveness.
Eden returns to the small town of Grand Trees after she receives a devastating call: her estranged mother has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s. Stepping from the rubble of her recent divorce, Eden drives to the small town where she and her mother used to spend their summers—and where her mother ran to twenty years ago with her lover, leaving Eden and her father behind in San Francisco. Despite the painful memories, Eden is there for one reason: to convince her mother to seek medical treatment.
What she finds instead is a life that continued without her. Eden’s mother has built her own family in Grand Trees, complete with loyal friends, weekly game nights, and a devoted caretaker–local hottie and nephew of her mother’s former lover, Caleb. Caleb’s teenage daughter, Abby, affectionately calls Eden’s mother “Gram.” As Eden watches from the margins, she’s forced to confront the painful question of how–and when–she became a stranger in her own mother’s world.
I should have come sooner. I should have figured out how to forgive her, but it would have meant exonerating–or condemning–myself. I never could figure out how our culpabilities intersected, whether we absolved or indicted each other by facing the truth of our own crimes. But I’m thirty-five. And I’ve lived more of my life without her than I did with her loving hand to lead me. I’m ready to fix this. I don’t know if forgiveness is possible, but acceptance must be. And I have to hope it’s enough to heal us both.
Eden and her mother have a complicated history and their journey toward healing felt messy yet achingly real. Williams doesn’t shy away from the complicated emotions that come with abandonment, guilt, and long-buried grief. I felt tears welling in the back of my eyes on several occasions, especially as the story expanded to include Eden’s father, showing how love can endure in fractured, imperfect forms. This is a story that understands there are countless shades of gray in loving someone forever.
And the romance between Eden and Caleb? It was soul-satisfying. Their connection feels earned and deeply comforting–the kind of love that makes the world feel brighter simply by standing beside the right person.
I’ll be thinking about the pages of this story for a while. It’s subtle, the way that The Epicenter of Forever weaves its way into your heart, but it’s unmistakable how the characters and Grand Trees linger well after the final page.
Celeste is a woman who is unwavering about certain things in life; three of those being books, cats, and cold brew coffee. If she can enjoy all three at the same time, it’s going to be a good day. Her favorite genres are fantasy or sci-fi romance, historical romance, and historical fiction but every few books she likes to mix it up with contemporary fiction, a good psychological thriller, or an inspiring memoir. She has a busy schedule working full-time for an online university but she makes sure to unwind each day with stories, either by reading to her elementary school-aged daughter or tucking herself in bed with her Kindle or the latest book she picked up at a local book store.
