Mama, It Ain't Over 'til The Pink Marble Comes

What person, on learning that he or she suffers from a life-threatening illness, wouldn't desire to stay active, rational, and capable of living life to its fullest until almost his or her last hours on earth? The author's spunky mother, Dottie Williams, is blessed with such final months after being diagnosed with terminal cancer. Mama, It Ain't over 'til the Pink Marble Comes, recently revised and updated including a sparkling new cover, records Mama's touching yet rollicking adventures as she prepares sadly and realistically to leave behind precious kin, yet joyfully readies herself to meet the Maker whom she has served. Told by Mama's firstborn, counselor Sandee Williams, with Jeanne Todd, the book illustrates Mama's determination to live by the principles of Romans 8:28, "And we know that all things work together for good..." Described as a cross between legendary missionary Lottie Moon and actress Lucille Ball, red-haired Mama tells her three adult children, after her diagnosis, "I've spent lots of years teaching you how to live. Now it seems I'm going to teach you how to die." She promises--and elicits promises from her offspring--that no secrets will exist about her illness and that all will be shared, even with her youngest grandchildren, at a level they can understand. There are no plaster saints here--just real people with whom the reader can readily identify. Early on, the author procures from Mama a vow to keep fighting the cancer as long as possible. One day, on an outing, Mama asks her daughter to stop by a mausoleum so she can pick her final, earthly resting place. Mausoleum officials note to Mama that some pink marble is on order to finish the mausoleum interior. Afterwards, the author makes Mama promise not to die until the pink marble arrives from Italy. Through her final days, gutsy, determined Mama indeed keeps beating the odds again and experiences dramatic rallies that defy medical explanation. Despite her illness, Mama supervises her family's move to a new city for her evangelist/preacher-husband's job, although that means having to start over with new oncologists. Until her last breath Mama ministers to others on chemotherapy who are fearful or defeated. A nurse sums up Mama's Homegoing by saying, "You do not die any better than you live. To die as beautifully and as sweetly as Dorothy Williams, walking with the Lord in the dark hours like that, she had to have had a life that was dynamic." Far from maudlin, the book focuses on triumph out of tragedy. Anyone who has ever lost a loved one will find this book both cathartic and inspirational. E-Mail: orders@hannibalbooks.com.