Are your dreams worth fighting for?
Meet Jake. He wants to be a soldier hero. Meet Andrew. He's a Pacifist with a brilliant mind. How can they ever become friends?
Enter Jessie, Jake's little sister. She wants to run the family ranch - an impossibility in the patriarchal world of her rural home.
For Andrew and Jessie, their dreams don't fit in with the world they were born into.
Along comes Jake, the most unlikely of all people to understand Andrew. In addition to Andrew's brilliant mind, he is a Pacifist, while Jake is in ROTC and about to become a soldier. Somehow, these two opposites find a way to become friends.
Jake's tragic death in the opening days of the Iraq War leaves Jessie and Andrew reeling.
Jessie suddenly finds herself all alone in the fight to save their family cattle ranch, even as the patriarchy of the Valley seeks to crush her.
Andrew's questing mind is driven to the brink of madness as he seeks to balance his Pacifist convictions with his friend's sacrifice. Andrew wrestles with various religious answers to war and life in a classroom setting as his beliefs are challenged by other more conventional religious structures.
Drawn together, this unlikely pair of Jessie and Andrew struggle to find meaning in their loss while they help each other fight for their dreams and their love.
Readers Say...
"During the summer of 2010, I read Jeff Stilwell's first novel, Fighting for Eden. I liked it well enough to put it on my bookshelf. Recently I pulled it off the shelf and read it again. I like the book as well as I did the first time I read it." Amazon Review
"Fighting for Eden is a great read. Mr. Stilwell pulls together an in-depth look at the angst of ranchers in this brave new world of what is healthy to eat, the conundrum of why we are in Afghanistan ten years later, what is patriotism, the profits that can be garnered from the tragedies of this difficult situation, and the coming of age of two young people." Amazon Review
"Fighting for Eden is one of the best first novels I've read in a long time. Jeff Stilwell created a world I didn't want to leave." Amazon Review
