Book Review: Even Now

Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner

Even Now     Amazon US TPB Amazon Canada TPB
Karen Kingsbury
Class/Genre:   Fiction   Religious Fiction   Christianity   Young Adult
Series: Lost Love (Kingsbury) # 1
Zondervan, Jan 2006, $14.99

Raised by her loving grandparents, college freshman Emily Anderson always wanted to meet her parents, but no clues existed to find them. That is until now when her beloved Papa cleaning out the garage finds a stashed away old box containing items that belonged to her mother. She hopes they include clues to finding her parents so she can ask them why they abandoned her. Inside she finds a journal of “Lauren loves Shane”, dated 1988.

Shane Galanter is engaged to marry, but he has doubts as he never got over his teenage love for his neighbor Lauren, whom he impregnated; he considers whether he can settle and how fair that is to his fiancée. Though she never once called home, journalist Lauren Gibbs never forgot the infant she left behind nor the boy she loved; she assumes that is why she goes out of her way for the Iraqi children impacted by the horror of war and will always remain single. Their determined offspring has a clue to her mother’s whereabouts and plans to find her to ask why.

As always Karen Kingsbury provides her audience with a deep character study that focuses on mostly Emily’s parents, but to a degree on her and her two sets of grandparents as she learns why her paternal side and her biological mother dropped her as if she never existed; only her maternal grandparents nurtured her with love. Thus Emily though a secondary player is the catalyst that brings everything together and the glue that keeps the plot focused. Fans will enjoy this deep emotional family drama in which you can go home, but do not wait too long because what really counts may no longer be there.

Harriet Klausner

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner