Girl Interrupted, Trying to Cope

Published: February 14th, 2012
Interrupted
By: Rachel Coker
Zondervan
ISBN-13: 9780310729730


Can love really heal all things? If Sam Carroll hadn't shown up, she might have been able to get to her mother in time. Instead, Allie Everly finds herself at a funeral, mourning the loss of her beloved mother. She is dealt another blow when, a few hours later, she is sent from Tennessee to Maine to become the daughter of Miss Beatrice Lovell, a prim woman with a faith Allie cannot accept. Poetry and letters written to her mother become the only things keeping Allie's heart from hardening completely. But then Sam arrives for the summer, and with him comes many confusing emotions, both toward him and the people around her. As World War II looms, Allie will be forced to decide whether hanging on to the past is worth losing her chance to be loved.

Review

   Allie has had a hard life so far, but she is happy living with her Mother.  Things change suddenly though when her Mother becomes sick with a brain tumor, becoming progressively worse until she dies leaving Allie alone.  She thinks she can make it one her own, but Allie is forced to become foster daughter to a woman who seems to want to replace her Mother.  Determined to not forget her Mother and the opposition she had to religion, Allie distances herself from everyone in her new life, just biding time until she can leave.  Then a boy from her past shows up and throws her life into a tailspin, forcing her to reconsider her bitter and lonely approach to life.  Can she let go of past disappointments and allow herself to love again, even when it seems like war on the horizon might endanger everything Allie has left in her life?  This book was like looking in a mirror at times.  When I was younger, I was a lot like Allie - bitter, depressed, mad at the world and unwilling to recieve love from anyone with actual BELIEF in it being real.  That could have made this a hard book to read, but instead it made it hard to put down because Rachel Coker drew a portrait for a character that I could fully relate to.  My heart broke for Allie when she lost her Mother, the only person she'd ever really had in her life.  I understood her reluctance to 'replace' her Mother with a new family, even if a times Beatrice does break through her tough exterior.  This was a love story between Allie and her childhood friend Sam, with the anguishing backdrop of WWII but it's mostly a story of allowing oneself to find redemption and love wherever you can, letting it into your soul.  Also, although it's marketed as Christian fiction it didn't get overly preachy but managed to showcase what real Christian love looks like.  Rachel Coker is a talented author who managed to touch my spirit and the only complaint that I have really is the unrealisticness of Allie not recognizing Sam when they meet up after only four years apart.  Seriously?  This book is highly recommended for the beauty of its spirit.

VERDICT:  4.5/5  Stars

*I received an Advanced Reading E-book Copy from the publisher, via NetGalley. No money or favors were exchanged for this review. This book was published February 14th, 2012.*