Letters from the Orchard
When Lila Brennan returns to her family's Washington orchard, she has no plan—only the hope that distance and quiet can heal the losses she cannot name out loud. As autumn settles in, she finds herself drawn into the tangled roots of the land and the community she thought she'd left behind—most notably Cal Monroe, her childhood friend whose steady presence is both comfort and challenge. But the orchard holds more than memories. In its attic, Lila uncovers a cache of decades-old letters—words never sent, heartbreak and hope pressed between sheets of fading paper.
As she pieces together her family's secret history, Lila must decide what to salvage and what to surrender. Letters from the Orchard is a deeply moving novel of second chances, the quiet courage it takes to come home, and the gifts we inherit—grief, grace, and the possibility of new beginnings. Sometimes the only way forward is to go back to where it all began.
Love doesn’t always arrive with fireworks. Sometimes it grows quietly—between the rows, under your skin, until one day you realize it’s been there all along.
Joe Kovalck Jr
Letters from the Orchard
Behind the Story
I grew up in New England, where apple orchards were just part of the landscape—especially in the fall. Every year, we’d visit a local orchard for fresh apples, warm cider, and that kind of crisp air that somehow smells like childhood. Those memories stuck with me: the rows of trees, the quiet, the way everything felt a little slower, a little softer.
The idea for the trunk in the story came from a real one I inherited from my great-aunt. It’s an old steamer trunk she used on a trip back in the early 1900s, and when it came into my hands, I couldn’t stop wondering what it had seen. What if someone found something hidden inside? What if it held pieces of a life no one knew about?
That curiosity—blended with my love for quiet places and second chances—became Letters from the Orchard. At its heart, it’s a story about memory, family, and the unexpected ways the past still reaches for us.
