All's Forgiven

All’s Forgiven
A novel by Donan Berg

All’s Forgiven is anchored in Star City, Iowa, a university town, where thirty-two-year-old, unmarried Jenny Olsen lives with her unyielding mother, works for her miserly uncle, and is beset with troubles far beyond her wildest dream.

Jenny escapes Star City to Mardi Gras, New Orleans, after a car driven by her married younger sister, Ruth, with Jenny and niece Eileen as passengers, is involved in a hit-and-run accident that injures Jenny’s right leg and sends Eileen to the hospital intensive care unit. A witness reports the hit-and-run vehicle had a black and gold university vanity plate.

At the New Orleans Lakeview Hotel, Jenny’s suitcase is ransacked. Missing is her spare garage key. Events spiral. Long-distance sparks fly when Jenny’s mother calls with the plea to return home. Mother threatens she’ll divulge a secret from Jenny’s past. She rebuffs mother. Beyond finding a Pelican Bar cocktail napkin amid her scattered hotel clothes, she is further confounded by a strange call from an unknown male who tries to solicit information from her on an upcoming gem exhibit being hosted by Riddle’s Jewelry. They employ sister Ruth.

On a blackjack outing to a Mississippi River paddle-wheeler, a gentleman who sits next to her intrigues Jenny. As Jenny returns to Star City to attend niece Eileen’s funeral, he remains nameless. She learns of sister Ruth’s stolen car and meets the gaming boat gentleman while at work in her uncle’s bookstore. He, William Holmes, is a visiting professor from New York. His car has black and gold license plates.

Robert, a handsome local police officer of romantic interest to Jenny, tracks the Holmes car and its bumper dent to a body shop. Before the accident is resolved, Ruth and Jenny discover their mother is kidnapped. They found a bloody cloth in the mother’s basement. Of critical importance is the missing Queen Elizabeth brooch mother owned.

Unexplained events occur. A man at mother’s front door claims Jenny owes $11,000 in riverboat casino losses. She claims fraud. The gem exhibit arrives in Star City. Uncle John rents out space in his bookstore basement. There’s a common wall between the bookstore and Riddle’s Jewelry.

Jenny and Ruth receive a ransom call for their mother’s release. While told ‘no police’, they involve police officers Robert and Virginia. A “doctored” ransom drop at a farmhouse goes awry when Jenny finds a tape recorder with mother’s voice, but no mother. A planted video camera only catches the blue color of a kidnapper\’s arm. Ruth wears a blue coat. Virginia, while not known to be in the farmhouse, is seen in the nearby woods wearing her blue police uniform. This siting blends together with Jenny’s neighbor lady seeing Virginia, key in hand, near mother’s garage that houses Jenny’s car.

A second ransom drop proceeds with Jenny finding mother, a Queen Elizabeth brooch clutched in her hands, in the farm’s barn. The brooch is determined to be a fake. Mother acknowledges it always was.

Mother’s abduction is also a smokescreen to steal the exhibited gems. Mother’s kidnappers and the casino debt scammer were all tied to the gem heist. Professor Holmes proves he wasn’t the driver when his car hit Ruth’s car to injure Jenny and kill her niece.

Robert proves Virginia is part of the kidnap plot.

Underlying the kidnap, heist, and other events, Jenny forges a closer loving relationship with her sister and mother. Although her fantasy romance with Robert and William don’t end at the altar, Jenny promises herself all is forgiven.