Evening Ransom looked like she had it all: a ten-year marriage, two healthy little boys, a thriving business, a beautiful home and a circle of family and friends she loved. It looked exactly the way she imagined it would when she turned her back on a chance of a lifetime in Los Angeles and headed to the one place where love was guaranteed, and that was back home with her family.    After years of denial and pretending, Evening is forced to face reality when bereft in a loveless marriage and family, her heart literally breaks leaving her disabled.  Lucky to be alive, and in constant pain she has no idea that her husband is laying the groundwork to not just divorce her, but to erase her and keep their perfect life for himself.  Utterly vulnerable and unable to let go of the belief that she is loved, Evening makes herself a very convincing accomplice in her own undoing.

​

Four years after the heart attack, Evening’s life is unrecognizable to her. From a jail cell she remembered her near death experience and took inventory of her life.  Her circumstances couldn’t have been much worse, but the fact that she was still breathing meant there was hope.  She had limitless love for her children and as brutal as it was, at least she knew the truth and was free of the abusive husband and narcissistic family that nearly killed her.  With nothing but love and the truth on her side, Evening reinvented herself and created an entirely new life for herself and her children.

​

She devotes herself to learning everything there is to know about love and creating intimacy in relationships, and soon she has a successful coaching practice, she and her boys have a home of their own, and only after she no longer needs a man, one walks in and quietly and patiently earns her trust when she is given a second chance to fight the battle she lost years earlier.

​

It took an unimaginable nine years for Evening to save her sons from their abusive family, but finally in 2011 with only a few short years of childhood left, Evening won her sons their freedom, and in doing so she proved to herself that there was a part of her that was indestructible, and that armed with love and the truth there was nothing she couldn't do.    This is important because before her sons could begin healing, Noah discovered heroin.  For five years he fought valiantly to free himself, to be the artist, son, brother and friend that he wanted to be, and when he was home to celebrate his mother's birthday and the fourth of July he looked well, ke it, but a few days after going back to Portland, Evening received the telephone call every parent fears.  Her son had died of an accidental overdose at the age of 20.

 

Ravaged exposes our collective misunderstanding of what that means.  Love is not a feeling, but a decision, a choice and a commitment.  Love elevates us all.   Where there is narcissism, greed and abuse there is no love, but we pretend otherwise, we blame victims, we avert our eyes, we go to sleep.

 

Thinking readers will see themselves in the protagonist and  offer a prayer of gratitude.  knowing how easily the same thing could happen to us.  She tells her story in gripping detail with courage and honesty that inspires. Shining a light into the dark corners of the human experience, she reminds us that life is more fragile than we care to believe, but the human spirit is stronger than we can begin to imagine.

​