“I’m not mad, Mother; I just don’t want to speak to her.”

The conversations went round and round like this until the evening Colleen exploded, the words bursting from her as she stood in her kitchen in New York, jet-lagged and off her guard, with the cell phone on speaker. “Mother. Have you ever, even once, been upset with Hallie? Have you ever, even once, tried to see it from my point of view? Have you ever, even once, loved me enough to understand how this must feel?”

The phone had gone silent and Colleen heard Dad, who was on the extension listening in, release a long-held breath. Colleen dropped her head into her hands and waited for the rebuke, for the harsh words from Mother in her strictest voice. But instead she’d only replied, “Yes, I have understood.”

And with that the line had gone dead. The subject had never been raised again.

Colleen shook off the memory and rolled over to take her e-tablet from the bedside table, flip it open as the jaundiced light flashed on. She hadn’t worked much in four days—and although this usually caused a little flutter of panic, she’d been too consumed with all things Dad to think about work. But there were bills and rent to be paid; e-mails to answer; edits to be done. Not that she lived paycheck to paycheck, but close enough that she couldn’t wallow in Watersend and forfeit a month’s work.

The e-mail tab blinked and Colleen clicked on it, quickly scrolling through the spam and the sales pitches and the special deals at Anthropologie and Neiman’s as she looked for hints of her next assignment. There were a few offers—two to cover a music festival in Texas and one to write about a rodeo in Montana—but the one that caught her eye was from a Ms. Fisher and had the subject heading Your Ten Tips. She clicked on it first.

Dear Ms. Donohue,

We have been big fans of your travel articles for some time, and when the Ten Tips was released in Travel and Leisure it became our favorite. It was as informative as it was entertaining. We here at Penguin Random House would like to discuss ways for you to possibly turn your column into a travel memoir. Your writing is superb and your wit engaging.

Colleen stopped reading and almost laughed out loud—at first glance she’d misread memoir for memory. No, they did not want her memories. Well, at least not the ones that haunted her.

A memoir? About travel?