Here if You Need Me: A True Story » (Bargain)

It was while working through the grief and loss of early widowhood that Unitarian minister Kate Braestrup found her true calling. A law enforcement chaplain for the Maine Game Warden Service, she is the author of the award-winning memoir Here if You Need Me.

Ten years ago, Kate Braestrup, her husband, Drew, and their four young children were enjoying a morning like any other. Then Drew, a Maine state trooper, left for work and everything changed. On the very roads that he patrolled each day, an oncoming driver lost control, and Kate lost her husband. "Stunned and grieving, Kate decided to pursue what had been her husband's dream and became a minister. And soon she found a most unusual calling: serving as chaplain for search-and-rescue missions in the Maine woods, giving comfort to people whose loved ones are missing - and to the wardens who sometimes have to deal with dreadful outcomes. Whether with parents whose six-year-old daughter has vanished into the woods, with wardens as they search for a snowmobiler trapped under the ice, or with a man whose sister left an infant seat and a suicide note in her car by the side of the road, Braestrup provides solace, understanding, and spiritual guidance when they're needed most. Here If You Need Me recounts Kate Braestrup's journey from grief to faith to happiness.

The Washington Post - Jane Ciabattari

Kate Braestrup's Here if You Need Me can be read as a superbly crafted memoir of love, loss, grief, hope and the complex subtleties of faith. Or it can be read as the journey of a strong-minded, warmhearted woman through tragedy to grace…The meat of the book is Braestrup's description of her work as chaplain to the game wardens who conduct search-and-rescue missions for the state of Maine. And this element of the memoir alone is enough to make it fascinating, as she describes traveling with the wardens in search of murder victims, suicides, straying children and lost hikers. She accompanies the wardens to give comfort to the loved ones of those who are missing, to attend to the remains of those found dead and to minister to the wardens themselves…In Here if You Need Me, she allows us to stand with her while she ministers to those who are lucky enough to have the remarkable, steady, peaceful and wise Kate Braestrup to comfort them.