Saturday Cocktails w/ R. A. Russell

R. A. Russell is a practicing business-law attorney in Los Angeles and holds degrees from Claremont McKenna College and Harvard Law School. Raising Redemption is Russell’s debut novel.

Family Saga Traces Hardships & Triumphs of Four Generations

Recalling such epic novels as Roots and The Joy Luck Club, R. A. Russell’s sweeping drama chronicles four generations of the Tilman family as they search for the things that will relieve the pain of the past. With its roots in 1975, Raising Redemption is a stirring and provocative story of the shame, secrets, sacrifice and struggle of an African American family who has worked to establish a name synonymous with respect, honor and dignity.

To the Tilman women Ben Tilman was a symbol of redemption: a revered doctor, a loving father and husband; a man who defied all preconceived notions of what a bastard son of a hated man would become. When his teenage daughter Alicia, headed for the Ivies to continue the family’s upward rise, defies her father’s rule to stay away from Dickey Samson, she is unprepared for the consequences that rain down on her: a baby, a near shooting and estrangement. When Alicia discovers that her actions link the Tilmans and Samsons to a dark secret that will now live on through another generation, she runs away. On her own and truly alone, Alicia realizes that success is the only solution to shame, and she struggles to become worthy among the noble Tilman women.

Raising Redemption brings readers on a journey to discover the ultimate gift of love and the true legacy left for the Tilman women to embrace. Chronicling the hardships and triumphs of four generations, Raising Redemption is a sweeping tribute to the salvation we can only find from within.