A charming and well-crafted tale of family, compassion, and acceptance.
A pastor and a young mother connect over their love for a child with autism in this novel.
Hana is a parent trying to start a new life. But for the moment, she has ended up in the basement at her sister Kara’s house in a small town in Oklahoma. “Kara’s was a prettily packaged life, the kind with ribbons and a bow,” Kaufman (The Story People, 2016) writes of the two sisters. “Hana’s was a banged and dented UPS box left on the wrong doorstep.” Indeed, Kara has a seemingly perfect spouse and children while Hana has had to flee Cincinnati to escape her abusive ex-husband, Zeke, and struggles with her autistic son, Isaac. His behavior ranges from adorable (insisting on bringing his turtle, Rocky, everywhere) to disturbing (hitting himself or pulling out his own hair). After being humiliated during a service at Hope Church by one of Isaac’s tantrums, Hana thinks she’s at her breaking point. But suddenly, the small community lives up to its church’s name. Kara’s pastor, Matt Schofield, gladly lets Isaac examine his beard and tell him all about turtles. For Matt, Isaac is the chance to break out of his routine and make up for something terrible that happened to a similar little boy long ago, before autism was commonly understood. And for Hana, Matt might mean the chance for a normal life. Throughout this sweet story, Kaufman does an excellent job of portraying Hana’s frustrations and unrelenting love for Isaac. Her twinges of irritation when people try to explain away Isaac’s problem, even in helpful and loving ways, perfectly capture this mother’s efforts to treat her son like any other while also dealing with the realities of autism. These well-constructed tensions make it all the more satisfying when Matt finally arrives and connects with Isaac on his terms. The book stumbles a bit toward its conclusion, bringing Zeke back as an unnecessary—and far too creepy—last-minute villain, but readers should ultimately find the journey of Hana and her very special Isaac delightful.
A charming and well-crafted tale of family, compassion, and acceptance.Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-7586-5789-3
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Concordia Publishing House
Review Posted Online: Jan. 24, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
These letters from some important executive Down Below, to one of the junior devils here on earth, whose job is to corrupt mortals, are witty and written in a breezy style seldom found in religious literature. The author quotes Luther, who said: "The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn." This the author does most successfully, for by presenting some of our modern and not-so-modern beliefs as emanating from the devil's headquarters, he succeeds in making his reader feel like an ass for ever having believed in such ideas. This kind of presentation gives the author a tremendous advantage over the reader, however, for the more timid reader may feel a sense of guilt after putting down this book. It is a clever book, and for the clever reader, rather than the too-earnest soul.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1942
ISBN: 0060652934
Page Count: 53
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1943
Deep schmaltz in the Bible Belt.
Christian-fiction writer Martin (The Dead Don’t Dance, not reviewed) chronicles the personal tragedy of a Georgia heart surgeon.
Five years ago in Atlanta, Reese could not save his beloved wife Emma from heart failure, even though the Harvard-trained surgeon became a physician so that he could find a way to fix his childhood sweetheart’s congenitally faulty ticker. He renounced practicing medicine after her death and now lives in quiet anonymity as a boat mechanic on Lake Burton. Across the lake is Emma’s brother Charlie, who was rendered blind on the same desperate night that Reese fought to revive his wife on their kitchen floor. When Reese helps save the life of a seven-year-old local girl named Annie, who turns out to have irreparable heart damage, he is compassionately drawn into her case. He also grows close to Annie’s attractive Aunt Cindy and gradually comes to recognize that the family needs his expertise as a transplant surgeon. Martin displays some impressive knowledge about medical practice and the workings of the heart, but his Christian message is not exactly subtle. “If anything in this universe reflects the fingerprint of God, it is the human heart,” Reese notes of his medical studies. Emma’s letters (kept in a bank vault) quote Bible verse; Charlie elucidates stories of Jesus’ miracles for young Annie; even the napkins at the local bar, The Well, carry passages from the Gospel of John for the benefit of the biker clientele. Moreover, Martin relentlessly hammers home his sentimentality with nature-specific metaphors involving mating cardinals and crying crickets. (Annie sells crickets as well as lemonade to raise money for her heart surgery.) Reese’s habitual muttering of worldly slogans from Milton and Shakespeare (“I am ashes where once I was fire”) doesn’t much cut the cloying piety, and an over-the-top surgical save leaves the reader feeling positively bruised.
Deep schmaltz in the Bible Belt.Pub Date: April 4, 2006
ISBN: 1-5955-4054-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: WestBow/Thomas Nelson
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2006
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