Wednesday, January 08, 2014

Book Review - A Promise Kept by Robin Lee Hatcher

Publisher's Description: 

God was going to save her marriage, Allison was sure of it. But neither her husband nor her marriage had been saved. What had become of His promise? 

 Tony Kavanagh had been Allison’s dream-come-true. They were in love within days, engaged within weeks, married and pregnant within a year. Her cup bubbled over with joy . . . but years later, that joy had been extinguished by unexpected trials. The day Allison issued her husband an ultimatum, she thought it might save him. She never expected he would actually leave. She was certain God had promised to heal; it was clear that she'd misunderstood. 

 Now, living in the quiet mountain cabin she inherited from her single, self-reliant Great Aunt Emma, Allison must come to terms with her grief and figure out how to adapt to small town life. But when she finds a wedding dress and a collection of journals in Emma’s attic, a portrait of her aunt emerges that takes Allison completely by surprise: a portrait of a heartbroken woman surprisingly like herself. As Allison reads the incredible story of Emma’s life in the 1920s and 1930s, she is forced to ask a difficult question: Does she really surrender every piece of her life to the Lord?

 Drawing from her own heart-wrenching story of redemption, A Promise Kept is Robin Lee Hatcher’s emotionally charged thanksgiving to a God who answers prayers—in His own time and His own ways.

My Thoughts:
Robin Lee Hatcher is one of my favorite authors in the Christian genre so I was excited to see something new in the contemporary style from her.  For this story she draws from her experience of divorce and alcoholism to tell us the story of the main character, Allison.  As Allison tries to put her life back together, she questions whether she really heard from God when she was so sure God would save her marriage.   Her character is very relatable.  The disappointment that things didn't turn out as she thought and hoped, the confusion in whether she had heard from God and the obviously opposite outcome, the insecurity and unsureness of where her life was now headed are all things any of us struggle with in life. I loved the added dimension of the story of her great Aunt Emma's life which, unbeknownst to her, in many ways paralleled her own.  Some might say the ending wrapped up too neatly and nicely but I found the struggle to get to where the characters went and the time frame it took them fit very nicely.  I found the story to be encouraging to seek and totally lay one's life down to the Lord and to trust in His wisdom and ways.  The one thing that I didn't like about the book was that Emma's journal entries were put into a font that was quite a bit smaller than the regular type.  For my eyes that presented a touch of difficulty while reading.  But I did enjoy the story and the realness of the struggle of the characters.

Thanks to Booksneeze for providing this book free of charge for my honest review.  All thoughts and opinions are my own and I was not required to write a positive review.






2 comments:

Cindy said...

I'm struggingle with font in the larger size these days and this would cause me difficulty, perhaps it was done for a purpose.

Barbara H. said...

I have this in my Kindle app and am looking forward to reading it!