This book is indeed for women, if by women one means white, American,
middle-class, conservative Christian mothers. But there's little reason to
quibble; such women are exactly Kingsbury's target audience, and few of them
will be disappointed by these stories of angels, medical miracles and mothers
who really, really love their kids (the only exception being a "childless by
choice" woman who really, really loves her house). While Kingsbury claims that
these stories are true (there's no documentation or opportunity to corroborate
this), she has clearly taken liberties with the dialogue; the conversations
between doctors and anguished parents are straight out of 1960s-era medical
dramas. The majority of the stories fit a pretty old chestnut of a formula:
tragedy happens, the doctor says there's no hope, God intervenes (often in the
form of an angel), the patient miraculously gets better, then the doctor
shakes his head in disbelief, says that the recovery is inexplicable and
admits that he was wrong. In more than one case, the wrong medical advice is,
not surprisingly, to abort a gravely ill fetus. Two later chapters are a bit
more compelling in that the sick person indeed dies, and the miracle is the
good that comes from that death. There's little doubt that Kingsbury's
subjects had astonishing experiences, but the nuance, texture and reality of
those experiences are lost in the simplistic telling. Luis Palau's It's a God
Thing packs the emotional punch Kingsbury is going for, but with considerably
less treacle. (Apr. 4) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.
