Deceiving Elvera

This compelling story focuses on friendship, love, loss, and the life-changing power we gain by helping others. Spanning the decades from the 1960s to the present, the events play out in two primary locations, Thailand and Michigan's Mackinac Island.

On a cruise ship in the Gulf of Thailand, passenger Elvera Tharp, known as Miss E, has a reputation for being difficult—almost impossible—to please. When new employee Michael volunteers to be full-time steward to the ornery old woman, he's determined to succeed where others have failed. Over the course of the cruise, Michael learns bits and pieces of Miss E's tragic past.

As a teen, Chicago girl Elvera spends her summers on Mackinac Island, where she becomes friends with local girl Cathy Charbonneau. Elvera's parents are well off but work desperately to appear wealthier than they are. Cathy knows only the hardscrabble life of northern Michigan. But like kids everywhere, they connect over clothes, music, and complaints about the adults around them.

After high school, Cathy and Elvera move in different directions. Cathy marries; Elvera goes to college. When Cathy experiences tragic loss, Elvera steps back into her life. They are close until an ugly incident separates them again.

Cathy moves to Thailand, where desperate Khmer refugees crowd the border, trying to escape the chaos in their homeland. Moved by their plight, Cathy does what she can to help. Facing her own impossible situation, Elvera eventually joins Cathy, but terror awaits both women on a rain-soaked mountainside.

As he learns about Elvera's past, Steward Michael suspects the woman harbors even bigger secrets. Why is a policeman shadowing her? Why does she travel inland to find an old friend who's clearly a violent criminal? Who visits her stateroom in the middle of the night? In the end, what he learns brings Michael to a reckoning and a shocking conclusion.

 DECEIVING ELVERA is a heart-warming, heart-breaking story of friendship. Cathy and Elvera support each other through the hard times life deals to all, and like the best of us, they find ways to make their lives meaningful to others as well.