LEWIS RICHARD LUCHS
AUTHOR WEBSITE
BOOKS by Lewis Richard Luchs
To Read Excerpts, interviews or find out moreabout each book, click the links below.
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CHILDREN OF THE MANSE, Book ONE
A popular college town minister and his wife want to adopt a four-year-old girl but learn she has three older brothers and decide to welcome all four children into their home. They arrive from a bleak county children' s home, bringing with them invisible histories of neglect and abuse. This true story, based on case files and family interviews, opens with the children's background and the oldest boy's determined struggle to keep his family together. The four children barely survive ever worse threats as they lose the adults in their world to imprisonment, abandonment, and death. When all seems hopeless, a talented social worker intervenes, trying to change their fate. This is a lively and sometimes humorous story. Children of the Manse entertains as it describes how four wounded children respond to intelligent and loving foster care.
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CHILDREN OF THE MANSE, Book TWO
This sequel to Children of the Manse follows the development of the four adopted children—Lewis, Mark, Michael and Janey—through the identity crisis of adolescence to adulthood and beyond.Halfway through their adolescence, the children’s clergyman father accepts an offer to become the chief minister of the United Church in the “atomic city” of Los Alamos, New Mexico. The children welcome the more permissive environment in the Southwest and enjoy a high school in which half of the students are Hispanics. It is in New Mexico that the author’s lifelong interest in human cultures was born. While they no longer face immediate physical and psychological threats, adolescence and the formation of the children’s identities create new challenges. As their adoptive mother put it, when turning down a national award that would involve being away from home for weeks at a time, “My children are now teenagers and need me more than ever.” The origin of the author’s interest in an international career as an American diplomat is described in the chapter entitled “Guatemalan Summer.” As in the first volume of Children of the Manse, the adoptive father supplies the embarrassing moments and humorous stories. This true story is based on interviews, journals, family letters, and the author’s memories.
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DIPLOMATIC TALES
What is it like to be a diplomat in six far-flung nations? Lewis Richard Luchs gives you a behind-the-scenes look at life as a diplomat in this fascinating memoir about his career in the U.S. Foreign Service. He wore three hats at once in exotic Madagascar, witnessed a military coup d’état in Mali, saw the creation of modern Singapore, felt the excitement of working in a France emerging from the self-isolation of the Gaullist era, participated in shaping Islamic Malaysia’s future, and observed Australia’s efforts to redefine itself in a new Asia. In sharing his challenges, sorrows, and joys, he answers questions such as: What do embassies do? What do diplomats do? What stresses are put on a diplomat’s family? What is it like to face terrorist threats? Take a broader view of the world, find out what U.S. embassies do, and discover what life in the Foreign Service is like with Diplomatic Tales.
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THE STORY OF TWO LOVES
Falling in love in late middle age came as a surprise to Sharon and me. From the beginning, what drew us together was music and dancing. We enjoy singing, mostly show tunes from the great musicals of the 1930s, 40s and 50s. Sharon plays the piano, violin, and guitar. I play the piano and was delighted to play her 7 foot Knabe grand. I was a reluctant dancer at first but grew to enjoy dancing as we took lessons together. The second love in the title was not music but a four pound wonder named Ruby.