There was a bank of eucalyptus trees, twenty of them between Frank's hospital and Jake's rehab. They were on a street I knew that was quiet and a little hidden. They were across from the park where Jake played soccer as a kid, before drugs. Sometimes I would get out and walk and stop and cry at every fifth tree. But once I found myself smiling, "I have gone from soccer mom to a rehab mom." -- from Joy Falls
In Joy Falls, a traumatized family has an elusive desire for normalcy that is found in lyrical moments and humorous problem-solving. The novel is filled with characters who have the stamina for the chaotic present even as their personal histories invade. Joy Falls helps us, not in a self-help way, but in the way fiction helps through storytelling, interesting characters, and laughter. It is about the profoundness of children, the importance of humor, and what happens when we show up for our own lives.
Crooked Hearts Press publishes forgotten, overlooked, and thus disappeared women writers over the age of fifty-five, alongside veteran writers we recognize for their excellence.

Joy Falls is Barbara Allen's first novel. If she were given money for all the times this novel was a runner-up, she would be rich. She received an MFA from the University of Arizona in poetry. Her poetry has been published in literary journals, Ploughshares, New England Review, Seattle Review, and Fine Madness. She has received an Arizona Commission of the Arts fellowship and lives in Tucson, Arizona.