Brit Mott

A 7-year-old child climbs onto her father’s lap and embraces his warmth. It’s story time and on this particular day, her father has a surprise.

“Chameleon,” says the child’s father, “Today I am going to give you a gift.”

The child looks at her father’s empty hands and says, “Papa, I don’t see a gift.”

The father looks down with his blue eyes and says, ‘Mi hija, (my daughter), you cannot touch it; you cannot feel it; you cannot even see it. The gift I am giving you is an invisible box, and every time you sit on my lap, I want you to put my stories in this box.”

Thirty years later, Carmen Corrales Konneker bound her father’s stories in a book called My Father’s Quest: The True Story of an Orphan’s Journey. Read More


Excerpt from pages 25–26
Daniel hears her screaming. He drops his sticks and small rocks and runs toward the sound. In the distance he sees a man on a horse. Daniel runs to the well, realizing that is where the screams are coming from. By now his face is practically frozen, and his tears are flowing. He reaches the well and yells, “Mama, Mama! Are you in there?” And he hears a faint voice whimpering.

He turns the rope crank as hard as he can, but he is not strong enough to raise it. He keeps trying, but his hands are bleeding and he is yelling, "Mama, Mamita! I will pull you out, I promise. Please don't cry." He is desperate, and he cries when he feels someone taking the rope from his hands. Daniel turns and recognizes the man from the horse. He tells him that his mama is in the water. "Please, Mister, take my mama out. Help her!"

The man nods. "I will do as you ask, little one. Don't worry." The man pulls on the rope over and over again, and finally Teresa emerges. She looks frozen, with a pale blue face, and her lips are practically purple. She can hardly move.

My Father’s Quest is published for Amazon’s Kindle and is also available at wheatmark.com, Borders, and barnesandnoble.com. You can find Carmen on Facebook or you can learn more about her at myfathersquest.com.