Flower Toward the Sun

In 1905,

Rebecca leaves her Jewish shtetl in the Ukraine to join her fianc , Samuel, in Milwaukee. Ingrid leaves her orphanage in Norway to become the Picture Bride of Lars, a widowed Norwegian farmer in North Dakota.

But as Rebecca and Ingrid are processed together at Ellis Island, officials put them on the wrong trains and each is sent to the other's final destination.

Lars takes Rebecca to his farm and promises to help her find her way back to Samuel. Samuel convinces his family to take Ingrid in until they can locate Rebecca and return her to Lars.

Alone in a strange country and unable to speak English, Ingrid and Rebecca struggle against conflicting religions and cultures. It is hatred at first sight for the feisty Ingrid and Samuel and his Jewish family. Lars does not understand Rebecca's traditional Jewish practices. Both women attempt to escape to find their promised new lives in America, but fail and reluctantly return to their alien environments to build new lives.

After nearly a year, Samuel and Ingrid journey to the isolated farm in North Dakota, but the love that has blossomed between Lars and Rebecca threatens to destroy everything.

Marcia R. Rudin graduated from Boston University and earned a joint MA degree in religion from Columbia University and Union Theological Seminary. She studied for a PhD at the New School for Social Research and taught history of religion. She was a resident in screenwriting at the MacDowell Colony of the Arts. Her plays have received productions in Manhattan, New Jersey, California, West Virginia, and Michigan.

Marcia is author of the novel Hear My Voice and coauthor of Why Me? Why Anyone? and Prison or Paradise? The New Religious Cults. Her articles have appeared in such publications as The New York Times and The New York Daily News. An expert on destructive cults, she was quoted in Newsweek and The New York Times and appeared on Dateline NBC, CBS Evening News and CBS Morning News.

She and her husband, Rabbi James Rudin, live in Manhattan and Florida. For additional information, visit www.marciarudin.com