Home song / Lavyrle Spencer.

Are the sins of the heart beyond forgiving? The answer is revealed in LaVyrle Spencer's powerful new novel, Home Song. "Every person you meet changes you, every moral dilemma you face shapes your character," muses Tom Gardner, devoted husband, father, and high school principal as he and those dearest to him are struck by a bolt from the blue, which gravely threatens their security and trust. When a new student transfers to his school, Tom needs only to look at him to see that this teenager is the son he never knew he had--the result of a one-night stand on the eve of Tom's wedding years before. Brought up by an adoring, supportive and fiercely independent mother who never revealed the name of his biological father, Kent Arens is a fine young man of outstanding grace, intelligence, and character. But his very presence represents something deeper--and darker--to the members of Tom Gardner's happy family. To Tom's wife, Claire, Kent is the living symbol of an act of betrayal so bitterly wrenching she cannot forgive her husband. To their daughter, Chelsea, he is the boy she is beginning to fall for, until she learns the truth. And to their son, Robby, he is first a rival in the classroom and on the football field--and then the innocent force driving his parents apart. As the Gardners careen toward disaster, they must learn the true meaning of unconditional love. In that lesson Home Song strikes a chord in all of us.