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    Finding Heath: Young Lighthouse Keeper
    Finding Heath: Young Lighthouse Keeper
    Finding Heath: Young Lighthouse Keeper
    Ebook121 pages1 hour

    Finding Heath: Young Lighthouse Keeper

    By Mary Martsching

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    About this ebook

    Struggling with guilt and feelings of inadequacies, Heath searches for ways to deal with his new life on an island where he now lives with his estranged grandfather. A school bully and pressure from his basketball coach add to an already tense situation. To make matters even worse, an unexpected storm incapacitates his grandfather. Heath realizes the fate of the people caught in the raging waves and winds depends on him. Heath must be the Lighthouse Keeper now. Will he rise to the occasion, or will he fail again?

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWestBow Press
    Release dateMar 29, 2013
    ISBN9781449788506
    Finding Heath: Young Lighthouse Keeper
    Author

    Mary Martsching

    As a published author, former teacher, and reading specialist, Mary recognizes that people read books with characters that have similar interests, experiences, and problems to their own. She writes with lighthouse settings, based on her personal research, visits, and collections. Martsching lives in Mount Ayr, Iowa, with her husband and pets.

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      Book preview

      Finding Heath - Mary Martsching

      Copyright © 2013 Mary Martsching.

      Author Credits: D’Entremont, Jeremy. The Lighthouses of Rhode Island, 2006. Lighthouse Treasury. Murray, John. America’s lighthouses, 2000. Publications, International, Ltd.

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

      WestBow Press books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

      WestBow Press

      A Division of Thomas Nelson

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.westbowpress.com

      1-(866) 928-1240

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-8851-3 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-8852-0 (hc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-8850-6 (e)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2013904534

      WestBow Press rev. date: 4/18/2013

      Contents

      Introduction

      Chapter One  Haunted

      Chapter Two  Awkward Moments

      Chapter Three  Zachary Zeller

      Chapter Four  Early Practice Encounter

      Chapter Five  Face-to-Face Conflict

      Chapter Six  A Surprise Defense

      Chapter Seven  Heart-to-Heart

      Chapter Eight  Fun and Then Fear

      Chapter Nine  Heath’s Unexpected Offer

      Chapter Ten  Upcoming Evaluation

      Chapter Eleven  Building Relationships

      Chapter Twelve  Game Night

      Chapter Thirteen  Intuition

      Chapter Fourteen  Danger!

      Chapter Fifteen  Focus on the Mission

      Chapter Sixteen  Found! Heath, Young Lighthouse Keeper

      Afterword

      Glossary

      Helpful Resources/Further Reading

      Readers Guide

      To Louise Foley, who challenged me to write this book.

      For my sons, Bradley and Bryan, who supported my project.

      For my husband, Owen, who believed I could do this.

      To Cade Martsching and Martha Kibling, for reading, making suggestions, and encouraging me to publish.

      You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put in under a bowl. Instead they put it on a stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.

      —Matthew 5:14-16 NIV

      SEBlockLighthouse.jpg

      Introduction

      T his is my first book in a series of lighthouse books. Each book takes place at a different lighthouse. Heath, the protagonist (main character), is in every book, but new characters appear in the others. The second book is a mystery with its setting in Connecticut. The next book is another mystery featured in New Jersey. I hope you enjoy this action/adventure book and the others I write. Thank you for purchasing and reading this book.

      Chapter One

      image_212.jpg

      Haunted

      F ourteen-year-old Heath broke out in sweat as he lay tossing and turning on his bed. Dad! Mom! Where are you? The angry waves tossed the small rubber lifeboat. He grabbed the sides of his boat and watched helplessly as lightning flashed dangerously near him.

      Heath jolted up in bed, suddenly awakened by his own screams. For two years now, this recurring nightmare had awakened him from sleep. He gasped for breath, sweat dripping from his body. How many times did he have to relive the death of his parents in the stormy sea?

      Why didn’t I do something to help them? That same feeling of helplessness weighed heavily on his chest. His anxiety remained even after several minutes passed.

      Looking around his bedroom, Heath spotted a picture on his desk. Smiling back at him were his parents. They had posed in front of their small ship, Breath of Life. Heath stood in the background, his curly white-blond hair blowing wildly around his face. His deep turquoise-blue eyes matched his father’s. He remembered how close he felt to his parents. Why did this have to happen? Why did they die and not me?

      Before the boating accident, Heath loved the ocean. Summers were the greatest. Three months of sailing to new countries and islands—and no homework. What a blast! He loved the salty sea slapping him on the cheeks while he was lying on the deck; he loved the gorgeous deep red sunsets that made the water look as if it were on fire. Every port was different and intriguing. Heath’s favorite was in Barbados. The people welcomed Heath and his parents with hugs and kisses on the cheeks and led them to the neatest cabins. They looked like shacks with the straw roofs and shake-like outer siding. The fishing was terrific. Heath caught his biggest fish there. It was even bigger than his dad’s.

      Heath climbed out of bed. Looking out his octagonal window, Heath glanced down at the water below. I’m glad Grandpa made me swim after I moved in with him, Heath thought. After the accident and nearly drowning, he’d feared the ocean, but he’d since learned to respect its power and beauty even more.

      It is beautiful here, Heath whispered to himself. The sunsets are so cool…

      Heath sauntered into the living room and dropped his tall, slender body onto the couch with a thud. The home in which he now lived was small and cozy, like the huts in Barbados, and it always smelled like the ocean. That was as far as the similarities went, though. This stone building was built in 1848. It housed the first lighthouse keeper and his assistant. Comfort was not a consideration, so the building only contained what was necessary for people to live adequately.

      The house consisted of an open floor plan with a fireplace to heat the entire room. The galley kitchen was fine for one person but became crowded if two people entered at the same time. The stone walls were barren. Besides his bedroom, another small bedroom and a bathroom completed the first floor. It was a story and a half, with the upper half consisting of one giant room and a fireplace. This was where the assistant keeper lived. Sam McCandless currently served in that position for Heath’s grandfather, Owen Kramer, the head keeper.

      Safe Harbor Bay Lighthouse, located on Mohegan Bluffs in Rhode Island, was a light station. It was called a light station not only because it had a signal light, but also because there was a foghorn building outside the house, not far from the lighthouse. A stone stairway began at the shore and led all the way up the bluff to the house. In times of danger, sailors and families in small ships took refuge in the house along with the keepers.

      The light station was a sanctuary, a place of rescue. However, the cliffs had suffered lots of erosion over the years. As a result, there was talk of either shutting down this light station and replacing it with an automatic signal, or moving the lighthouse, foghorn station, and the home farther inland. That was a huge financial consideration, and Grandpa figured the latter idea would not become a reality.

      Heath loved running along the cliffs to keep in shape for basketball. His grandfather thought it was dangerous, but the smell of the salt rising up from the sea also brought back memories of times with my parents.

      Heath attended a private middle school on the island. Other schools on the mainland competed in basketball and baseball with his school, but those were the only sports his school could afford to support financially.

      Grandpa became Heath’s guardian after the accident. They both held each other slightly at a distance, not sure of each other’s feelings for one another.

      Grandpa Owen didn’t talk much about his son. Heath had visited his grandfather several times before the accident. Once was when his grandmother died of pneumonia, and the last time was with his parents the week before that fatal trip out to sea.

      I wonder how much Dad helped out here. I know he loved the ocean and sailing. I also wonder why Grandpa never talks about Dad. What happened between them?

      He remembered how his father had acted when he climbed aboard their ship after hanging behind to talk with Grandpa Owen. Face flushed and twisted in anger, he’d tossed a box aside

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