Beloved Daughter Series
When 13-year-old Claire Hamilton learns that she is a beloved daughter of the Presence, her life is changed. And its corollary—seeing others as equally beloved—is a bright thread that weaves throughout this series and the reason Claire chooses love whenever she's confronted with a challenge. This series chronicles Claire’s deepening relationship with her boyfriend Luke and with the Presence. Strands of science, magic, religion, and mysticism weave throughout this love story as Claire learns to love herself and others, learns the exquisite beauty of love, and learns how costly love can be. Claire also witnesses the damage patriarchal power structures cause. And perpetuate. Can one determined girl make a difference?
Beloved Daughter Book 1
Call of the Desert: Crossing
Fearful, twelve-year-old math nerd Claire Hamilton moves from California to Saudi Arabia in 1970—a world where cultures mingle and the desert sifts people like flour. Now her old ways of avoiding trouble and earning her parents’ love stop working. Could it be the desert's sifting?
When Claire finds a stick that can turn into a snake, it seems friendly enough, but it's not doing anything to help. Until the night Claire enters the desert to escape something worse than sifting, and she discovers her truest self and the love that is her birthright.
Beloved Daughter Book 2
Call of the Desert: Exile
Fourteen-year-old Claire Hamilton and the other ninth graders need to leave their home in Saudi Arabia next year for boarding school. But when Claire has to wear a painful back brace for scoliosis, a scheming new girl finds ways to isolate her from her boyfriend Luke and her other friends. The pain and isolation make Claire feel like she’s already gone, exiled from all that makes this home—her friends, her body, and the desert Presence who calls her ‘beloved daughter.’
The mystical black lioness sent to guide Claire urges her to reach out for help. But how can she do that when she can’t trust anyone? And the clock is ticking—Claire must find her way home before it’s too late and everybody she cares about is actually gone.
Beloved Daughter Book 3
Lord of All Hopefulness: Waking
Fifteen-year-old Claire Hamiliton isn’t interested in putting down roots at her boarding school in Switzerland. Creating a new “home” here will just make it more painful when she has to leave in a few years. Encumbered with a hideous back brace and an aching heart, Claire prepares for rejection and has already written off most of her fellow students as spoiled, rich, and heartless. What will it take to open her eyes to their reality? To the Reality that sees them as beloved?
Coming in 2026
Beloved Daughter Book 4
Lord of All Hopefulness: Labors
Sixteen-year-old Claire loves to help others learn math, but a “calling” (according to Frederick Buechner), is where her “deep gladness” meets their “deep hunger.” Too bad her math tutees hunger only for their dinner. At least Claire’s work on reversible hydrogen fuel cells in Dr. Kilpela’s secret lab satisfies the criteria—the world craves sustainable energy. Though Luke feels called by this work too, tradition and duty pull him toward the family olive business. Is that truly his reality, or will Reality reveal a different path?
Coming in 2027
Beloved Daughter Book 5
Lord of All Hopefulness: Homing
It’s senior year, and seventeen-year-old Claire has got everything under control. Until she must face old foes to help a desperate girl escape human traffickers. Until Claire must help Dr. Kilpela flee the shadowy Alliance of Conventional Energy Sources (ACES), who seek to silence her, maybe forever. Until Claire learns that Luke, working for Kilpela’s colleague in Andover, Massachusetts, mysteriously goes missing. Now Claire, who alone believes Luke is still alive, must call on her mystical allies and all the powers of Heaven to bring Luke home.
Coming in 2028