A heartfelt memoir that reveals the redemptive power of love, even through death.
In the early hours of January 9, 2018 unusually heavy rainfall combined with deforestation from the recent Thomas Fire and unleashed a devastating debris flow in Montecito, California. The unimaginable event was responsible for 23 deaths and cost $177 million in property damage. News of the mudslide that ravaged the unsuspecting community made national headlines. Among those headlines was the tragic story of the Cantin family.
Where Yellow Flowers Bloom chronicles the events leading up to and following the disaster that took the lives of Kim's husband David, their son Jack, and their dog Chester. Miraculously, Kim and her daughter Lauren were somehow spared. The book details Kim's journey of survival-through mourning her husband's death while recreating life for herself and her daughter, to following her intuition and receiving extraordinary support from her community to find Jack's remains. Her story is full of mysterious and awe-inspiring messages, signs, and synchronicities that prove reality is greater and kinder than we can conceive.
"The dark, thick slime seeped in under our doors. The muddy water came up through the bottom of our front walls and front doors. I looked down at Chester, lying on the floor near my feet. I told him, "Let's go!" But he tilted his head and looked up at me hauntingly as he lay on the carpet. Chester did not move. He seemed to know there was no escape. I heard a horrifying, unfamiliar noise that sounded as if I were standing under the walkway of Niagara Falls. Like the roar of an oncoming train, mere inches away."
This is Kim's first book, and she hopes her story can show others, especially those affected by trauma and grief, the power of determination and resilience, and the importance of looking for positivity when at times it seems impossible to find.
Yellow flowers grow in an unexpected place. Despite the magnitude of loss and grief, they help Kim to see beauty where there should be none. In the end, love found a way.