kryptoniangirl

A pleasant read about the sorts of people I think we all know - decent folks from various backgrounds trying to live good Christian lives. Despite the idealistic pastoral setting, this isn't mere verbiage to accompany a Kincade painting. The problems are just the sort of things you find when you look under the surface - broken homes, distant fathers, divorce, illness, echos of old grudges, and difficult marriages. You walk down mainstreet smelling the roses and chuckling slightly that people would accept anything so bucolic as real. Then you see the parish priest struggling with diabetes and a woman worried about her police officer boyfriend and a boy whose mother doesn't want him and a woman who desperately needs a new heart. It's like the meet and greet at church where you shake hands with a lot of people who apparently have things all together, but once you've lived and prayed with them you start to see the struggles. Most of us live pretty mundane lives grieving over our small hurts and triumphing over our small victories. It's nice to see a book that recognizes that. Plus, I love seeing a book with all the readability of a better class of romance that doesn't need to confine itself to the "boy meets girl" formula in order to be heartwarming and interesting.

2023-05-30 06:07