Bottomland Page 25
Thanks especially to my family: my mother, Lorene Hoover, for inspiration and editing; my sister, Lisa Carstens, and Mike, Hannah, and Cayla; and my brother, David Hoover.
Thanks always to Randy Bailey for his love, patience, and support, for putting up with this strange kind of life, and for giving me a second family.
Finally, thanks to my late cousin, Hazel Hoover, for her offhand remark that “you look just like one of your great-aunts,” and to my late Aunt Irene (Renie) Israel, who despite being ill, opened a family album in her lap and told me about the two sisters who “disappeared,” showing me the photograph that began the whole thing.
