Long before she became a famous, chart-topping recording artist, Meredith Clark was brutally wounded, insecure, and lonely; part little girl, part fragile woman. Just as she had fled a traumatic situation as a scared sixteen-year-old, she once again sought to put miles between herself and an abusive relationship. Piling everything she owned into her car, and stealing away from New Orleans in the middle of the night, she headed anywhere north, as quickly as possible. Only making it as far as Grayson, a tiny northern Louisiana town nestled in Caldwell Parish, a blown-out tire and no usable spare put the frantic nineteen-year-old at the mercy of strangers, who not only took her in for the night, but insisted she stay with them in their home for as long as she needed to, while she rested and worked through her ordeal. It was here that Meredith, who had never known her father and who lost her mother when she was only a child, discovered what it was like to belong to a real family. It was here that she found that she could still laugh, that she could cry the kind of tears that brought healing, that she could share the gift of music with a nine-year-old little girl who loved her as much as if she were her own sister. It was here that Meredith met Father. Father's Friend, although not part of the Father Series, which is comprised of Father's Choice, Father's Wings, and Father's Song, is a linked novel that takes the reader back to the beginning and peels back the layers of who Meredith Clark really is. It allows us to understand how someone who is her own deepest hiding place is able to reluctantly venture out into the open, while desperately clinging tightly to her Father's hand. She is slow to heal, slow to trust, slow to confide, but the music Father breathed into her has a life all its own and is stronger than Meredith's desire to remain hidden.She eventually braves the return to her childhood home, where those who frightened her are no longer a threat. What awaits her there will bring about circumstances that are used by her loving Father to lead her to her calling, to her purpose, and to love. Although Meredith maintains a tough exterior and brandishes a dry and sometimes caustic wit, along with a sharp tongue, Father sees through it all, and will one day bring a man into her life who sees what He sees.