The Truth is in the Wine

Dear Reader:

Everyone knows that when alcohol goes in, the truth usually comes out. In his latest novel,
The Truth Is In The Wine
,
Essence
bestselling author, Curtis Bunn, puts that theory to task. When a couple struggling to decide whether to remain married or not decides to take their dream vacation to the Napa Valley in California, along with both of their mothers who cannot stand to breathe the same air, anything is likely to happen…and it does.

Happiness and pain in a marriage are often interchangeable and when two people truly love each other, things can change in the blink of an eye…or a roll in the hay. This novel could be a much-needed therapeutic aide for a lot of couples trying to make a decision about whether to stick it out with each other or part ways. It is an intense at times, humorous at times, portrayal of why family and love trump everything else. I am sure that readers will be engaged in the characters and storyline from the first page. Bunn is a prolific author who never tells the same story twice, a godsend in today's literary climate.

As always, thanks for supporting the authors of Strebor Books. We always try to bring you groundbreaking, innovative stories that will entertain and enlighten. For a list of complete titles, please visit
www.zanestore.com
and I can be located at
www.facebook.com/AuthorZane
or reached via email at
[email protected]
.

Blessings,

Zane

Publisher

Strebor Books

www.simonandschuster.com

For my Felita, who is sweeter than any wine.

And that's the truth.

Always, I give honor and praise to God for his unlimited blessings. He certainly carried me through this book. Thank you, Lord.

My family, which I love so much, remains to the core: my late father, Edward Earl Bunn, Sr.; he was not much of a wine-drinker, as I recall. Scotch was his drink of choice; my mother, Julia Bunn, who is simply wonderful; my brothers, Billy and Eddie and my sister, Tammy. My grandmother, Nettie Royster, remains our spiritual foundation.

Curtis, Jr. and Gwendolyn (Bunny) are my children, my life-blood, my heartbeats. My nephew, Gordon, has always been like a second son. And my niece, Tamayah (Bink Bink) and nephew Eddie, Jr. are blessings that I love so much. My cousins, Greg Agnew and Warren Eggleston, are like my brothers, as well as my brother-in-law, Deryk. And I am grateful for cousin Carolyn Keener and uncle Al and aunts Thelma and Barbara and Ms. Brenda Brown, who has been like an aunt/second mom much of my life.

Additionally, Felita Sisco Rascoe is my wife-to-be, foundation, heart and soul, super-duper closest friend and beacon of hope.

Again, Zane, Charmaine Roberts Parker and the entire Strebor Books/Atria/Simon & Schuster family have been great, and I am eternally grateful for you. I'm proud to be a part of the wonderful, talented Strebor family.

I enjoy listing by name the supporters because you all mean so much to me: My ace, Trevor Nigel Lawrence, Keith (Blind) Gibson, Kerry Muldrow, Randy Brown, Sam Myers, Ronnie Bagley, Tony Starks, Darryl Washington, Darryl (DJ) Johnson, Lyle Harris, Monya Bunch, Tony (Kilroy) Hall, Marc Davenport, Tami Rice-Mitchell, Brad Corbin, William Mitchell, J.B. Hill, Bob White, Kent Davis, Wayne Ferguson, Tony & Erika Sisco, Betty Roby, Kathy Brown, Venus Chapman, Nicole McDowell, Tara Ford, Flecia Brown, Christine Beatty, Greg Willis, Al Whitney, Brian White, Ronnie Akers, Jacques Walden, Dennis Wade, Julian Jackson, Mark Webb, Kelvin Lloyd, Frank Nelson, Hayward Horton, Mark Bartlett, Marvin Burch, Derrick (Nick Lambert), Gerald Mason, Charles E. Johnson, Harry Sykes, Kim Mosley, Ed (Bat) Lewis, Shelia Harrison, David A. Brown, Leslie LeGrande, Rev. Hank Davis, Susan Davis-Wigenton, Donna Richardson, Sheila Wilson, Curtis West, Bruce Lee, Val Guilford, Derek T. Dingle, Ramona Palmer, Joi Edwards, Warren Jones, Deberah (Sparkle) Williams, Leon H. Carter, Zack Withers, Kevin Davis, Sybil & Leroy Savage, Avis Easley, Demetress Graves, Anna Burch, Natalie Crawford, Najah Aziz, George Hughes, Monica Harris Wade, Yetta Gipson, Mary Knatt, Serena Knight, Sonya Perry, Denise Taylor, Diana Joseph, Derrick (Tinee) Muldrow, Rick Eley, Marty McNeal, D.L. Cummings, Rob Parker, Cliff Brown, D. Orlando Ledbetter, Garry Howard, Stephen A. Smith, Clifford Benton, Len Burnett, Lesley Hanesworth, Sherline Tavenier, Jeri Byrom, E. Franklin Dudley, Skip Grimes, Carla Griffin, Jeff Stevenson, Angela Norwood, Lateefah Aziz, Billy Robinson, Jay Nichols, Ralph Howard, Paul Spencer, Jai Wilson, Garry Raines, Glen Robinson, Dwayne Gray, Jessica Ferguson, Carolyn Glover, David R. Squires, Kim Royster, Keela Starr, Mike Dean, Veda McNeal, Dexter Santos,
John Hughes, Mark Lassiter, Tony Carter, Kimberly Frelow, Michele Ship, Michelle Lemon, Zain, Tammy Thompson, Karen Shepherd, Carmen Carter, Erin Sherrod, Tawana Turner-Green, Sheryl Williams-Jones, Vonda Henderson, Danny Anderson, Keisha Hutchinson, Olivia Alston, John Hollis, Dorothy (Dot) Harrell, Aggie Nteta, LaKesha Williams, Ursula Renee, Carrie Haley, Anita Wilson, Tim Lewis, Sandra Velazquez, Patricia Hale, Pam Cooper, Michelle Hixon, Regina Troy, Denise Thomas, Andre Aldridge, Brenda O'Bryant, Ron Thomas, Pargeet Wright, Laurie Hunt, Deborah Sharpe, Mike Christian, Sid Tutani, Tracie Andrews, Toni Tyrell, Tanecia Raphael, Tammy Grier, Roland Louis, April Tarver, Penny Payne, Cynthia Fields, TaToya Tokley, Dr. Yvonne Sanders-Butler, Alicia Guice, Clara LeRoy, Denise Bethea, Hadjii Hand, Petey Franklin, Sibyl Johnson, Shauna Tisdale and The Osagyefuo Amoatia Ofori Panin, King of Akyem Abuakwa, Eastern Region of Ghana, West Africa.

Special thanks and love to my great alma mater, Norfolk State University (Class of 1983); the brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha (especially the Notorious E Pi of Norfolk State); Ballou High School (Class of '79), ALL of Washington, D.C., especially Southeast and the team at
www.atlantablackstar.com
.

I am also grateful to all the readers and book clubs that have supported my work over the years and to my many literary friends Nathan McCall, Carol Mackey, Linda Duggins, Terrie Williams, Kimberla Lawson Roby, Walter Mosley.

I'm sure I left off some names; I ask your forgiveness. If you know me you know it is an error of the head, not the heart. :-) I appreciate and I am grateful for you.

Peace and blessings,

CURTIS

In vino veritas
(in vee-noh ver-i-tas)
Latin
. In wine, there is truth. A Latin expression that suggests people are more likely to say what they really feel under the influence of alcohol.

T
he pain shot up Ginger Wall's left arm, a jolt that rendered half of her body immobile. Her heartbeat was rapid, even though it felt like her chest was collapsing. Breathing was a chore. She was sure she was going to die.

No one was around to help her. No one was around because there was no one in her life. Her husband was her husband, but pretty much in name only; their marriage was on a spectacular descent. And he was in the house, anyway. Her daughter, whom she had smothered like a blanket, was just off to college. The few friends she maintained were kept at a distance. She was alone, and that thought pushed her to the edge of death.

Unable to move and desperate for air, Ginger resigned herself to dying—right there behind the wheel of her Lexus coupe in the garage of her modest townhouse near downtown Atlanta.

Seconds went by, then minutes, and finally she passed out. When she came to a few minutes later, the pain was gone. She could breathe easily. There was relief of the pressure she felt on her chest.

It almost seemed like a dream, like she pulled into the garage and passed out from exhaustion, and that scary moment came to her in her sleep. The reality was that the thought of entering a loveless house paralyzed her with anxiety and fear. She knew it was not a dream because her face was damp with tears.

Ginger had recently returned from dropping off her only child, Helena, at college. Paul, her husband, said his goodbyes to his baby girl at the airport, a fear of flying keeping him from making the trip to Washington, D.C.

But not her mom. Helena had become Ginger's everything. Right around the time Paul was laid off from his job as a heating and air conditioning repair specialist was when their marriage turned into an eighteen-wheeler going downhill with no brakes. He lost his self-esteem and she, eventually, lost interest. The combination made for a mundane existence and rapid fall over an eleven-month period.

This was not easy to accept for Ginger. She was crushed, crestfallen. It was if someone had died. As if
she
had died.

Only she hadn't. She was alive, but not living. To breathe, Ginger threw what was left of herself into Helena, serving as mother, chef, security, fan, chauffeur and anything else that kept her occupied and gave her some sense of fulfillment. That was why she pleaded with her child to attend a local college; her going away was akin to pulling the plug on the activity in Ginger's life.

“Mom, you know I love you and I'm going to miss you,” Helena said when she decided to attend college in Washington, D.C. “But I've got to get away. Not from you, but from Atlanta. You are the one who told me when I turned fifteen that I should go to school out of town, that it would help me to grow up and be responsible. Ever since then that has been my goal. Plus, you have Dad.”

Somehow, through the strife, they managed to shield Helena, to, indeed, fool her. She thought her parents were in a fulfilling relationship. If she had taken the time to
really
pay attention, she would have noticed that all the cheery conversation around the
house was between her and her mom or her and her dad. There was only token dialogue between her parents, and none of it loving.

But she was merely seventeen when the downturn began;
her
life was the focal point of
her
existence. She simply did not notice.

One night while Helena was at a school play, the troubles in the marriage reached a crescendo.

“I thought about it. I thought about it a lot,” Paul said, rising from the dinner table with Ginger. “I've got to go.”

Ginger had a forkful of risotto headed toward her mouth when he said that. She dropped it into her plate below. He said it so casually, as one would reveal it was raining outside. The words registered with Ginger instantly, but for a nanosecond, though, she thought he meant he had to leave the dining room because there was a game on television he had to see. Or that he was tired and needed to go to bed early. Or that he wanted something from the store and had to go and get it. It could
not
have meant what it really sounded like he meant. It was not what he said; it was the
way
he said it that clued her in.

So, she did what anyone would do: She asked for confirmation. “What do you mean?”

Paul continued toward the kitchen. He did not bother to turn around.

“Divorce, Ginger,” he said, again so nonchalantly that it was staggering. “Divorce.”