“Lisa Tracy’s Family Furniture is a marvelous mix of tenacity and tenderness. Yes, it is about the history of certain carefully collected heirlooms; but it is about something much greater and more human. It is about why we hold on to the things we keep, how we let go of the ones we lose. It is about the soul of a family, any family, our expectations and regrets, our loves and losses, our search for meaning and belonging in the things that fill our houses and our hearts.”—Robert Goolrick, author of A Reliable Wife

“Plush stories of love, war, life and death are lovingly tucked inside the drawers and chair springs of a remarkable family's furnishings. Lisa Tracy brings them to life with tender humor and due respect.” —Tanya Maria Barrientos, author of Family Resemblance

“Lisa Tracy’s Objects of Our Affection is a lovely and loving book, revealing the life of her well-traveled military family not just through the furniture they chose to keep, but through what they lost and surrendered along the way. Moving from the heights of San Juan Hill to the courtyards of China’ s Forbidden City, this book shows us why the possessions of our ancestors exert a profound influence upon our modern lives. Anyone who finds meaning and memory in the belongings of their forebears will enjoy this book.” —Jeff Gammage, author of China Ghosts: My Daughter’s Journey to America, My Passage to Fatherhood .

“ Objects of Our Affection is a memoir in belongings, right down to the salt in an old glass shaker with a dented lid. Being a born Southern story-teller, Lisa Tracy has captured beautifully why we love our belongings–not for their actual value but for the family stories they hold, and for the way they allow us to follow the threads of continuity in the red velvet fabric of life.” —Susan Caba, author of Guilty Pleasures

“This is a book that gathers emotional momentum as you read it. Gradually you realize it is a rare look at the women who have devoted their lives to the men who have fought America's wars. I read the closing chapters with tears in my eyes.” —Thomas Fleming, author of The Officers' Wives and West Point: The Men and Times of the U.S.Military Academy