Vivian Rising is as much about learning to have faith in something—whatever form it happens to take—as it is an ode to the grieving process that at one point or another we all go through.  When someone who seems to be the center of our universe dies, we are faced with the seemingly unanswerable question:  “now what?” Along with a gigantic thanks to the influence and support a grandparent can be, my wish is that the novel provides a flicker of promise—that the hopeful place we emerged from can once again be ours if we learn to adjust to, and learn from, the inevitable realities of loss and change. 

Vivian Sklar has always depended on her wise and feisty grandmother—ever since Viv’s mother took off twenty years ago.  When Grams dies, Viv feels hopeless and completely alone.  As she searches for something to believe in again, Viv finds hope in a most unlikely place: the cluttered second-story walk-up of Kavia, an alarmingly perceptive astrologer. Viv is skeptical—she thinks horoscopes are as reliable as fortune cookies—but when Kavia’s first reading dissuades her from taking a train that later crashes, she’s hooked.

Under Kavia’s guidance, Viv begins to process her grief and rebalance her life. Every prediction Kavia makes seems to speak directly to Viv’s life, and so far, the stars haven’t steered her wrong.   It’s all finally going well, until the stars tell her something she doesn’t want to hear—that the bond Viv has forged with the insightful yet guarded Len isn’t meant to last.  Now, she might just have to learn to have faith in herself…