Hope in Patience (ARC)

Hope in Patience by Beth Feldbaum


Ashley is struggling to recover in a small Texas town, called Patience after being freed from the tyranny of her stepfather. For as long as she can remember, Charlie has been raping her, and her mother has been ignoring it. For as long as she can remember being raped has been her only identity. For as long as she can remember nothing has changed.For as long as she can remember, she has been broken. For as long as she can remember life has been hopeless

Can she find Hope in Patience?

My review:

Oh, boy, here we go.

This book is the straw that broke the camels back for me. I finally am going to talk to you about a growing trend in the YA world.

The sub-plot.

I am not the blogger to discuss politics, this is not a political digest blog. I am usually put off by characters who flagrantly do not share my morals, values and ethics, but I do review around them because an opinion does not, or should not, a YA fiction book make. Agreed? No matter your political stance can you agree to that? Awesome, you’ll get to the heart of this review if you do.

Hope in Patience is a book trying to sell a liberal world-view to unsuspecting teen readers masquerading as a book on the healing process of a rape victim. Oh, man, I can feel the giant squids of anger. Remember, you don’t know my political opinions, I could be a liberal for all you know, I’m just reviewing what happened between the pages of a book truthfully here.

Still with me? I’m glad. Now, just because I said “masquerading” does not mean I think the book was devoid of the plot it advertised. The scenes with Dr. Matt and Ashley are amazing, as a psychology major going for her doctorate in child psychology I think you should believe me when I tell you that Ashley’s response to her healing journey and Dr. Matt’s methods of helping are phenomenal, realistic, truthful and heartfelt.

Any book that turns a story about healing from a serious and painful lifestyle of being raped, into a one-sided political and religious statement will never be recommended on my blog. No matter my own political views, this is just unacceptable. I will never tolerate any book that shows flagrant intolerance of Christians, people with liberal viewpoints, people with conservation viewpoints, those whose skin is black, white, or purple, when you turn a story to become a subliminal and angry agenda, I will call the author on it and tell you the truth.


In the case of Hope In Patience, Feldbaum’s true thesis behind this book is that small-town America is currently filled with one-minded, cruel adults and sheep-like young Christians who are unwilling to accept the enlightened views of the liberal-minded and are wrong in everything they believe. Secretly, they are afraid of exposure because they all know they are all wrong and narrow-minded.

I want to stress that if the author had gone the other way, showing intolerance for those who profess a liberal world-view, or those who are atheists as evil, vile and stupid human beings, I would have given the same review.

Alright, I am getting off my soap-box, which I bring out only occasionally, when a book review, let me stress that, when a book review warrants it. I couldn’t escape talking about it this time, the sub-plot ended up overwhelming the entire book and instead of concluding the novel using the main plot, the author summed things up using the sub-plot. When the author makes those choices, they become a part of your review, like it or not.



Now, here is a more traditional review:



The characters were imbelievable. Outside of Dr. Matt’s office, the character’s were too extreme to be legitimate. The book is an angry book, it’s intolerant of people who think differently than the author and I felt angry reading it, not just for the reasons above, but because no one stuck by Ashley. I really hated her mother, Charlie, her grandparents and the judge. If this has been the authors only experience with people, I am very, very sorry for her, but there are in fact judges who believe in justice, parents who will stand by you, and Christians who love people.



Notes on the Names: I thought they were very small-town Texas, traditional, some trendy choices. Nothing added or subtracted from the book.



Thoughts on the Cover: I loved this cover, the model’s posture is perfect for the way Ashley crawled into herself, but the setting, the clothes, they all offered a brighter tomorrow. This cover does support the main plot to a T.