Keeping Faith by Jodi Picoult

Keeping Faith by Jodi Picoult

 

I’m on a Picoult binge. What surprised me was that the last Picoult book I read, Change of Heart, featured the main characters in this book.

 

This book was published nine years before Change of Heart, but the characters are as vivid as ever.

 

From the back cover:

 

When the marriage of Mariah White and her cheating husband, Colin, turns ugly and disintegrates, their seven-year-old daughter, Faith, is there to witness it all. In the aftermath of a rapid divorce, Mariah falls into a deep depression – and suddenly Faith, a child with no religious background whatsoever, hears divine voices, starts reciting biblical passages, and develops stigmata. And when the miraculous healings begin, mother and daughter are thrust into the volatile center of controversy and into the heat of a custody battle – trapped in a mad media circus that threatens what little stability the family has left.

 

This isn’t so much like Picoult’s later books where there are surprising twists, this is a simple story of a little girl who starts performing miracles and a family who is going through a messy divorce in the midst of it all.

 

There are parts that doesn’t make sense to me, especially with Colin’s actions towards the end. Why go on with the custody battle when you already know your daughter needs her mother? The book tells the story with Colin’s lawyer as the bad guy in court, but all Colin had to do was say the word and the battle would’ve been over.

 

It was a good story, however, and I loved it because of all the religious controversy and the miracles happening left and right. Picoult’s name really speaks for itself, and I seldom feel the need to tell how much I liked her books, because I always do!