Descritpon or Synopsis : The Thrilling Tetralogy Begins . . .
LAYING WITHIN THE MARK/synopsis /Book One: Mary Garibaldi Powers Finishes the Dress but not Without a Kick-n-Fit/Marion Coleman Brown (M.C. Brown)

The first of a four-fold drama that begins in the jungle-thick back walls of Cannon Falls' bluff country, far away from prying eyes. It is the perfect place for what Mary Garibaldi Powers has come to do. But, she gets interrupted.

A malicious snowstorm ensues. She takes refuge inside a rural Gothic cottage centuries old. It not only awakens the buried memories stored in her tattered cobweb boxes in the basement, but it also stirs the sleep of those long ago locked away. They had come back. They had all come back.

And so it begins. And so does the tantalizing premise of Laying Within the Mark.

What if every female child ever born through Mecky Thurman St. Claire's family's bloodline, generation after generation, possesses this special mark? What if this special genetic determiner immunes them from aging and dying? What if after centuries pass there is a tear? What if during this tear another female child is conceived? But, this time, there is no mark. What do you think the women in her bloodline will do to her since she's not like their kind, jeopardizing the lives of generations of women in her family and the lives of millions like their kind across the world?

Mary Garibaldi Powers is that child.

She has no mark. Or so they think.

Does she possess the mark and they just can't see it?

What’s at stake is how one child’s persistence and defiance in the face of overwhelming adversities lead to an evolving self-hood of truth and acceptance; purpose and rebirth.

Because Mary Garibaldi Powers is unlike their kind, this innocent child is plagued with a lifetime of paralyzing fears--fears webbed in lies and deceit; fears webbed in separation, abandonment, and rejection;
fears webbed in terror-torturing pain, psychologically and emotionally and physically.

It seems that there are always pernicious snowstorms and blizzards and lingering floods of yesteryears invading Mary Garibaldi Power’s present life memories. It is against this backdrop of tempestuous disturbances that the twists and turns of this story unfold.

She remembers precisely what day it is. November 28, 1957, a wicked snowstorm brews. She is five years old. Mecky Thurman St. Claire comes to Richmond, Virginia to remove her from her home, taking her back to the St. Claire’s valley in Belford Ross, Minnesota.

Her mother, Anna St. Claire Garaibaldi, anxiously waits, watching for her mother's
arrival.

Mary Garibaldi Powers is now in the hands of Mecky Thurman St. Claire, her evil grandmother, the one woman, who is at the helm of it all; the one woman who leads the unrelenting battle towards her demise.

Mary Garibaldi Powers is driven by the outward need to please and be accepted by Mecky Thurman St. Claire. She strives in every way imaginable (doing everything ever asked of her ), and yet she is still not accepted. All she gets in return is more of the same, Mecky Thurman St. Claire's wrath.

Because Mary Garibaldi Powers' loneliness is lead-heavy, she is driven by the inward need for love and friendship. She finds love in the St. Claire's beautiful valley, in her paintings, in her luminous poems, in her record collection . . . When Mecky Thurman St Claire’s torture is at its zenith, it drives her to a dark place in her psyche. There she findstumultuous (tormenting) friendships.

She is met and befriended by the bad-evil-good-evil-terror-torturing watchers, Ellenton Fairhope, a radio weatherman and, Hoffman, a transposing piece of wrath in nature along with the UT's (Fairhope and Hoffman's Unearthly Things). These imaginary childhood friends become so hauntingly real until they manifest themselves into her world.

They never leave.

Later, at age fifteen, she meets one more friend, Cora Powers who becomes her mother-in-law. And finally, as a well-seasoned adult, she meets a guide, The Dark Woman.

Mary Garibaldi Powers is surrounded by evil, smothered in fear, starved
for love, and set free through her persistence for truth. A truth that she wishes she had never pursued.

But, she persists and defies, often times barely—fighting to the death just to stay alive one more day and sometimes one more second.

Mecky Thurman St. Claire is a strong-willed, deeply horrifying villain, a creature of unimaginable beauty and hypnotic charm. Because there's been a tear, she and others like her are uncertain of continued beauty, impenetrable powers, and absolute control and dominance over life and death all because of one child. Mecky Thurman St. Claire is not about to let it go down that way.

She is fueled by the outward need to destroy the child because, first, the tear occurs in her kingdom on her watch and she feels responsible. Second, her gods make it abundantly clear that the punishment meted out to her will be the ultimate curse if she doesn’t kill the child. Third, she's put the lives of generations of women in her family bloodline and the millions of populators and settlers in their order around the world in harms way. And finally, after centuries of killing and taking what they need from mortals to sustain the mark’s regenerative powers, their continued survival maybe at an end; extinction is upon them.

Further, Mecky Thurman St. Claire is fueled by an inward need to have the love of two men, Sam St. Claire, her husband, and Johnny Belford Ross, her lover (both of whom are gagagams). Johnny Belford Ross however is the billionaire who lives across the valley—he holds nothing from her: his riches, his wealth, his community clout and political status, and above all his eternal love. When she finally gets to hold
them both, she feels total satisfaction and completeness.

With persistence and defiance, Mary Garibaldi Powers uncovers, with the help of the Dark Woman, as she is known, her true past and the truth about her birth. In an instant her life changes forever. In an instant her past gets thrown out with the trash. She struggles with revelation after revelation—secret after secret—and yes, murder after murder: The man she calls her father isn't and yet he is--Antonio Garibaldi; the man she calls her grandfather isn't yet he is—Sam St. Claire; the man she calls her neighbor across the valley is and yet he isn't—Johnny Belford Ross; the man she calls her husband is and yet he isn't--Carl
Powers. This child's father is murdered by the order given by Mecky Thurman St.Claire. This child's husband is murdered by the order given by Mecky Thurman St. Claire. This child's best friend and mother-in-law, Cora Powers, is murdered by the order given by Mecky Thurman St. Claire.

If that that's not enough, Mary Garibaldi Powers discoveries that she too has the mark but unlike their kind.

The shocking secrets of Mary Thurman St. Claire and her kind overwhelms her.

With the naked truth in hand and her newfound powers, she sets in motion a plan to make war on Mecky Thurman St. Claire. She sends Mecky Thurman St. Claire an invitation to war, avenging herself, the death of Cora Powers, and all of the other innocent people who got in her way.

Mecky Thurman St. Claire responds and accepts.

They’re ready.

Mecky Thurman St. Claire stages the battle in New Orleans out on the Mississippi. They come dressed in their warring cloaks and other gear.

Mary comes dressed like the Dark Woman.

In a climatic finish, Mary Garibaldi Powers searches for Mary Thurman St. Claire’s Achilles heel. She finds it and uses it to destroy her.

LAYING WITHIN THE MARK is a dramatic and compelling story about how one child’s persistence and defiance lead to an evolving self-hood of truth and acceptance; purpose and rebirth.