About the Story

Fueled by the strength of familial love, In the Path of Angels tells the tale of an estranged father and daughter unknowingly drawn together through dreams, chance and circumstance via communications from departed souls.

Far from her Appalachian roots, third-generation intuitive, Jennifer Barlow attempts to abandon her psychic gifts by seeking balance in an organized life as a massage therapist in Los Angeles. Paradoxically, the previous summer she finds herself under psychiatric supervision and heavily medicated for a recurring dream of a woman beaconing to her, whose provenance she obsesses over. Convinced it is a cryptic message from an earthbound spirit, Jennifer and her skeptically pragmatic best friend, Alison Garcia, form an unavoidable fissure in their otherwise playful relationship.

Now, a number of months later, and after her seemingly coincidental acquisition of a mysterious cross pendant, not only have aspects of the dream returned, accompanied by a series of provocative occurrences possibly of a supernatural bent, but the long-standing disagreement with Ali reemerges along with Greg Milano, an irresistible but incompatible ex-boyfriend, which in turn reveals Jennifer’s indelible wounds left behind from being a fatherless daughter.

Jennifer’s west coast life is abruptly interrupted when the news that her mother, Sarah Barlow, has just endured emergency heart surgery. Being the only child, Jennifer realizes she must return, at least temporarily, to her childhood home in Southeastern Ohio, where she discovers the path of the soul is far from a straight line.

About the Donna Rawlins

From the small town of Lancaster, Ohio, a few miles north of the beautiful Hocking Hills and location of the heart of her novel, In the Path of Angels, the now
Los Angeles based Rawlins comes from a family of five musicians and a matriarchal lineage of metaphysical intuitives. Rawlins currently resides with her husband, Robert Feist, owner of Ravenswork Studios in Venice Beach, California, along with their 15 year old cat, Bhava.

The multi-hyphenate Rawlins–-a singer-songwriter-voice actor—whose tunes have appeared in more than 10 network television shows and 5 major feature films including Mr. Woodcock, The Bold and Beautiful, The Unit, The Shield and Dawson’s Creek, is an active member of the Screen Actors Guild, AFTRA, and BMI. Represented for voice over by the William Morris Endeavor Agency, her abundant national commercial spokesperson credits range from Macy’s to United Airlines to Suzuki. She has also recorded numerous audio books such as Sydney Sheldon’s Tell Me Your Dreams; Tami Hoag’s, Taken by Storm; Memoirs of Cleopatra by Margaret George; Laura Zigman’s, Animal Husbandry; Dana Reinhardt’s, Harmless and Female Intelligence, by Jane Heller.

Rawlins has come to novel-writing as an outlet for her seemingly boundless creativity and as a natural terminus to years of chronic journaling and short-story writing. Her most recent non-fiction creation; SKINNY! An Inspirational Cat Tale, further displays her versatility as an emerging author.

This unstoppable fire to create seems a natural result of Rawlins’ colorful, unusual upbringing with her family of performers. A globe-trotting gypsy songwriter returns to her hillbilly roots in a literal and figurative homecoming that allows her to emerge a novelist.

Rawlins has written an extraordinary first novel. With the audacity of a seasoned writer, she deftly tackles multiple themes: the effects of being raised in a broken family on adult male-female relationships; the process by which the unseen world comes to be seen by those who seek it out; and the importance of geography in familial-cultural continuity. It’s rare when a novel is so well rendered, so reaching in scope, and so thematically relevant that it transcends type and demands a wider reading. In the Path of Angels does that and more.

The multi-hyphenate Rawlins–-a singer-songwriter-voice actor—whose tunes have appeared in more than 10 network television shows and 5 major feature films including Mr. Woodcock, The Bold and Beautiful, The Unit, The Shield and Dawson’s Creek, is an active member of the Screen Actors Guild, AFTRA, and BMI.  Represented for voice over by the William Morris Endeavor Agency, her abundant national commercial spokesperson credits range from Macy’s to United Airlines to Suzuki.  She has also recorded numerous audio books such as Sydney Sheldon’s Tell Me Your Dreams; Tami Hoag’s, Taken by Storm; Memoirs of Cleopatra by Margaret George; Laura Zigman’s, Animal Husbandry; Dana Reinhardt’s, Harmless and Female Intelligence, by Jane Heller. 

Rawlins has come to novel-writing as an outlet for her seemingly boundless creativity and as a natural terminus to years of chronic journaling and short-story writing.  Her most recent non-fiction creation; SKINNY! An Inspirational Cat Tale, further displays her versatility as an emerging author.

This unstoppable fire to create seems a natural result of Rawlins’ colorful, unusual upbringing with her family of performers.  A globe-trotting gypsy songwriter returns to her hillbilly roots in a literal and figurative homecoming that allows her to emerge a novelist. 

Rawlins has written an extraordinary first novel. With the audacity of a seasoned writer, she deftly tackles multiple themes: the effects of being raised in a broken family on adult male-female relationships; the process by which the unseen world comes to be seen by those who seek it out; and the importance of geography in familial-cultural continuity. It’s rare when a novel is so well rendered, so reaching in scope, and so thematically relevant that it transcends type and demands a wider reading. In the Path of Angels does that and more.