Author Talk : Debbie Russell - "Crossing Fifty-One"

A week before Christmas 1951, Dr. Ralph Russell, a successful San Diego surgeon, risked everything to voluntarily enter a locked federal drug-treatment facility known as a “narcotic farm.” Sixty-five years later, Dr. Russell’s granddaughter Debbie suffers a debilitating crisis of identity when her father, (Dr. Russell’s oldest son) always her biggest fan, is accepted into hospice. Debbie’s investigation into her paternal lineage reveals family secrets and ignites her mother’s volatile outbursts, propelling her into therapy. When therapy fails her, the grandfather Debbie never knew saves her, and she collaborates with her dying father one last time to make her biggest dream come true.

Crossing Fifty-One pulls back the curtain on the internal struggles of midlife and provides a blueprint for redefining one’s self beyond the constraints of addiction and dysfunctional family dynamics.