Lucretia Bingham

They wake me up in the middle of the night and clamor to be heard.

-Lucretia Bingham, author of Beyond Absolute Love

Lucretia Bingham was roused from her sleep by the voice of Cornelia Woodstock, a character who begged the telling of her coming-of-age story in Beyond Absolute Love.

After floundering through a peculiar childhood of living in strange places, Cornelia is now sixteen years old and living with her narcissistic mother, following years with her father. Life has changed. Cornelia is a sought-after fashion model and her mother, Nevin, is an insecure woman who mooches off her daughter. Cornelia\’s efficient manager, Geraldine Dodge, has a coarse personality and exhibits it toward Cornelia and Nevin. She refers to Cornelia as \”the gull\” and talks to Nevin as if she is a child.

Modeling in New York and other fashion meccas is exciting for many, but not for Cornelia. Bored and unfulfilled, she lives through repeated mundane motions until she meets twenty-two-year-old Alexander. Unfortunately, her naïveté places her in a relationship with a painful ending.

Lucretia Bingham began Cornelia\’s life journey in her previous novel, Absolute Cornelia. As a little girl isolated on her mother\’s goat farm, she would eventually live in India with her wealthy father in a religious \”group\” when she was seven. She\’d gone from living with an emotionally unreliable parent to one who had rigid moral standards. Cornelia also met Hadji in India, who opened her heart to possibilities.

The journey continues in Beyond Absolute Love. After the \”Alexander heartbreak,\” Cornelia finds the courage to leave the modeling world of NYC for a trek through Switzerland and India. She reconnects with her father and eventually meets Hadji again, her childhood love who is presiding over the religious cult she once knew so well – a place that had encompassed power-hungry and manipulative activities, a place of victimization.

In India, Cornelia\’s emotional pain does not cease. She has to make agonizing decisions about life, love, and death. Ultimately, she realizes that her travels will not solve her difficulties, but instead, she learns to search within herself for the answers.

Lucretia Bingham feels in her spirit that Beyond Absolute Love will captivate as many readers as those who discover it, perhaps because the essence infused in the story is from her intriguing life. Lucretia lived in the Bahamas from age 7 through 21, providing significant experiences. Writing and art studies at Sarah Lawrence College was a step toward her creative endeavors, leading to a food and travel writer position for the LA Times and work for notable magazines. Lucretia, however, credits her storytelling grandmother for giving her an appreciation for the craft. Her grandfather, Hiram Bingham, showed her the thrill of connecting with the earth. His resume included archeologist, history professor, and politician. He is primarily known for rediscovering the largely forgotten Inca city of Machu Picchu and inspiring the movie character, Indiana Jones. Lucretia Bingham has been to Machu Picchu five times, once as a work assignment for Condé Nast to follow her grandfather\’s research path and at other times as a tour guide.

Lucretia Bingham welcomes your visit to her website and would love to hear from you. Her email address and social media accounts are listed on her contact page. In addition to the glimpse of what\’s in her books, you\’ll also see her beautiful paintings. Look for Lucretia\’s exquisite taste in clothes and home decor, too – no doubt influenced by her innate artistic talent and her travels around the world.

Lucretia, I like having a snippet of your original artwork on a postcard, and your paintings shown on your social media are gorgeous! Best wishes with your writing and artistic pursuits. Thank you. 🙂

~Anita~

Lucretia Bingham is represented by Nine Speakers, founded by Diane S. Nine  in 1988.