Growing Wings

Previously published as Growing Wings by Vas BrownGrowing Wings is Samantha's story, in her own words, about how she learned to become herself and to find meaning, purpose, and acceptance in her life and in the lives of those around her. But this is not just Samantha's story, it's everyone's story. It's a story about how, in everything we do, we all search for the same things: meaning, purpose, and acceptance. Like most of us, Samantha searches for all three by stumbling naively and drunkenly into unknown paths. And where no clear path exists, she carves out one by digging up and confronting ghosts of past and present. As Samantha approaches her 30th birthday, she begins to question the meaning, purpose, and direction of her life. Her job as a mid-level civil servant in Westminster is mundane and uninspiring, her love-life is non-existent, online dating is not working for her, and the strained relationship with her mother, with whom she still lives, is getting worse. Samantha's mundane and invisible existence in London suddenly takes an unexpected turn and she finds herself in the news headlines and at the centre of a national scandal. The fast-moving events force her to confront the issues at the core of her problems: the strained relationship with her mother, her identity, and what she wants out of life. To lighten the load of the serious issues she is grappling with, Samantha adopts an unapologetic narration style that takes the reader on a journey peppered with her naïve, comic, and often-gullible opinions, judgements, thoughts, and absurd incidents that follows her trail from South London to Rotterdam, Amsterdam, and back.