Only a truly gifted writer can break your heart and make you laugh at the same time. Dancing Backward In Paradise by Vera Jane Cook is a brilliant debut novel that explores the definition of happiness and tries to make sense of the unexpected twists and turns that influence the direction life takes. When the story begins, Grace Place is nineteen-years-old and lives in the Paradise Trailer Park in Hixon, Tennessee. The year is 1966 and Grace is content exploring the back roads, swimming in the cold waters of Tennessee and dancing in the wind. But when her life is thrown off track by a man named Lenny Bean, Grace becomes entwined in a medley of lies, murder and betrayal. Trying desperately to remain true to herself, while her life begins to crumble, her mother, Maddie Place, steps in and takes over, more determined than ever to change her daughter's destiny.