Answered Prayers - Danielle Steel

Danielle Steel's 56th bestselling novel is about family and friendship, about one
woman's struggle to break free from the past-and the man who helps her triumph. And
most of all, it is about daring to believe in...Answered Prayers.

On the outside,
Faith Madison is the very picture of a sophisticated New Yorker. Slim, blond, stylish,
Faith has a life many would envy. Overcoming a childhood marked by tragedy, married
to a successful investment banker and having raised two grown daughters, Faith has
enjoyed her role as mother and wife, and the good life that emanates from their bustling
Manhattan town house. But every step of the way, Faith has carried within her a secret
she could divulge to no one. And with it, she has kept an even more painful secret
from herself.

For Faith, it is the sudden death of her stepfather-a man who, like
her husband, Alex, always remained just beyond her reach-that will touch off a journey
of change and revelation. At the funeral, painful memories flood back-and an old
friend reenters Faith's life. Faith is greeting mourners, when she hears a voice
behind her and a single word that brings a quick smile to her face: "Fred." Only
one person aside from her older brother, Jack, called her that. Brad Patterson was
Jack's best friend, a long, lanky boy who teased, tormented, and protected Faith
when they fancied themselves "The Three Musketeers" as kids. When Jack died years
later, Faith and Brad came together again in their common, inconsolable grief, then
lost touch once more amid the demands of families and busy lives a continent apart.


Now a lawyer in California, Brad has reentered Faith's life just as she is making
a decision that plunges her marriage into crisis. Determined to fulfill a long-held
desire for a career of her own, Faith applies to law school against her husband's
wishes, igniting a barrage of anger and recrimination. Faith's only solace is the
correspondence she has begun with Brad, a man trapped in an empty marriage of his
own, a friend she once lost and has found again. Soon e-mails are flying between
them, bridging three thousand miles, sharing much-needed friendship, support, laughter.
And as these two childhood friends rediscover each other, something extraordinary
is beginning to happen. In the safety of their friendship, Brad will find the courage
to make a decision he should have made years before. And Faith, too, is changing,
beginning to believe in herself-and in her right to grab hold of her dreams. Gathering
a strength she never knew she had, Faith is finally ready to face the most painful
step of all: of sharing the secret that has long been haunting her, and truly opening
up her heart for the first time in her life.

With unerring insight into the hearts
of husbands and wives, lovers and families, Danielle Steel tells a wise and moving
story of the secrets that wound and the choices that heal-and of the second chances
that come only once in a lifetime.