SOMEBODY ELSE’S DAUGHTER

Mark Bramhall starts the story with a high level of drama as he portrays Nate Gallagher, a young man who is deeply in love with both his lover, Cat, and with heroin. The pair are driving across the country to deliver their baby daughter, Willa, to adoptive parents. Bernadette Dunne’s narration takes over 17 years later as Nate, no longer a drug addict, but now a failing writer, takes a teaching job at Pioneer School, where Willa, with whom he’s had no contact all these years, is a student. The result is a conflict between fathers, biological and adoptive, as well as a tangle of subplots involving the secrets and sordid pasts of a multitude of characters. Dunne expertly juggles the roles and projects a tension that helps the various subplots build to a dynamic conclusion. S.W. © AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine [Published: NOVEMBER 2008]