An On the Healing Journey Book

Zuri and the
Lighthouse Falls

Name: Zuri and the Lighthouse Falls
Price: 21.99 USD
Availability: PreOrder
Author: Autumn Dillon

Book One of the Lighthouse Falls series

You were made on purpose. Every part of you.

Preorder price $21.99 · $24.99 after launch

Preorder the hardcover Read the first pages

Zuri and the Lighthouse Falls by Autumn V. Dillon, Book One of the Lighthouse Falls series

What it's about

Zuri Joseph has always known the answer. She just can't always say it out loud.

Every night, nine-year-old Zuri crosses a bridge of glowing river stones into the Lighthouse Falls, a hidden place where her grandfather, Pastor George, keeps the gate for children the world has never quite known how to understand.

Children whose minds move too fast.
Whose feelings run too deep.
Whose words come differently.
Children who have spent too long wondering if something is wrong with them.

At the Falls, Zuri learns the truth: she was never broken. She was made on purpose.

But someone else is waiting in the dream-country.
His name is Korah.

Once, Korah carried a gift of his own. Then he set it down. Now he searches for children whose lights have begun to dim, offering to make life easier if they will only hand their gifts over to him.

When Korah comes for Zuri, she will have to decide whether everything the world has told her about herself is louder than the truth God has been speaking all along.

Zuri and the Lighthouse Falls is a faith-filled middle-grade fantasy about family, belonging, courage, and children learning that being different does not mean being broken.

Because God does not make mistakes.
You were made on purpose. Every part of you.

Zuri and her friends gathered on the glowing river stones beneath the lighthouse

The children of the Lighthouse Falls

Inside the world

The keeper of the gate.

Zuri and Pastor George

At the crossing

Pastor George

Keeper of the gate

Every night, Zuri crosses the bridge of glowing river stones

Zuri face to face with Korah, a tall stranger holding a dim lantern on the stone bridge

But someone else is waiting at the Falls

From the author

This story is deeply personal to me.

It is a love letter to my great-grandfather, Pastor George Milton Joseph, my great-grandmother, Ruby Faye Joseph, and my grandmother, Rochelle Dillon, the people who first taught me what it meant to be loved, covered, prayed for, and reminded of who I was.

But it is also for the children.

For the child who knows the answer but cannot always get the words out. For the child whose mind moves faster than the room. For the child who feels everything deeply. For the child who has been called too much, too quiet, too sensitive, too different, or made to feel like something about them needs to be fixed before they can be fully loved.

I wanted to write a story that tells those children something I hope they never forget:

There is nothing accidental about the way God made you.

You may need support. You may need people who take the time to understand you. You may experience the world differently than the people around you. But different does not mean broken.

You are worthy of being understood before you ever learn how to explain yourself.
You are worthy of belonging before you ever learn how to fit in.
And you were made on purpose. Every part of you.

That is the heart behind Zuri and the Lighthouse Falls.

Autumn

An excerpt · Chapter One

Step inside the Lighthouse Falls.

Chapter One

The Words That Wouldn't Come

"I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made."

Psalm 139:14, NIV

Zuri Joseph knew the answer.

She always knew the answer. The trouble was not in her head. The trouble was in the small narrow place her words had to pass through to get from her head to the air, and sometimes that place got so tight and so tangled that nothing could get through at all.

Mrs. Martha was waiting.

"Zuri?" she said. The kind of kind that was actually a sigh. "Can you tell us, sweetheart? What is the process called, when a plant turns sunlight into food?"

Zuri opened her mouth.

The word was right there. Photosynthesis. She had read it in the textbook three nights ago. She had written it on a flashcard. She had said it out loud in the bathroom mirror, twice, and it had come out clean both times.

She took a breath.

p-
ph-
photo-
the bird
the cage
the door is too small
p- pho-

"Photosynthesis," Madison said, three desks over. She did not raise her hand. She tossed her ponytail like the word had cost her nothing at all.

Preorder the hardcover

Be the first to know

A smiling girl holding her hardcover copy of Zuri and the Lighthouse Falls

Bring Zuri home.

The hardcover is available for preorder now at $21.99, and the price moves to $24.99 once the book launches. Every copy from the first printing ships as soon as it arrives. Prefer to wait? Join the list and you'll hear the moment the book ships, along with gentle notes from Autumn along the way.