When You Believe

by Deborah Bedford

Warner Faith, August /03

ISBN: 0446690414

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Lydia Porter loves everything about her job as a teacher at Shadrach High School. But recently she's become concerned about one of her students, Shelby Tatum, who seems troubled. Convinced that Shelby's problems go beyond common teenage angst, she confronts her--only to have Shelby accuse Charlie Staines, the popular history teacher, of sexually abusing her. Suddenly Lydia is faced with the hardest decision of her life, for Charlie Staines is not only her colleague, he's her fiancÈ, and the man she believes God sent as the answer to her lonely prayers. But can she stand beside her man in the wake of such suspicion, or must she unflinchingly support the confused and grieving girl whose life will forever be altered by her decision? (c) Amazon.com

You may not want to read this review until after you've read the story as it may give away some information that you won't want to know beforehand!

This is an ambitious novel about the faithfulness and steadfastness of love - human love and the love of God . Lydia must choose to do the responsible thing and turn the man, whom she considers her beloved one, into the authorities. Lydia must deal with her feelings not only in the security of her home, but in the public eye as her actions have swift and serious consequences. Not only does she have to deal with a young girl's anxst and horrific experiences, she is forced to dive in to her own past experiences full of pain and hurt as well. As she learns to deal with her own, then she is able to find the strength to question the accuracy of the young girl's story and decide how to respond to her fiance.

I say this is an ambitious novel in that it deals with some pretty horrific experiences of sexual abuse and misconduct between trusted adults and minors, and yet it fails to be credible to me because it portrays the common (and questionable) psychoanalytical theme of "rediscovering one's own sexual abuse" -pain that has been hidden for years and finally comes out later in life - a topic that makes me cringe. There are two points I question here: One, I am extremely sceptical of such occurances of regained memory. I think that such things are easily suggested to someone in the midst of emotional trauma. (This from someone who does engage in the journey of self-knowledge with the help of a psychotherapist - and notes that not all cases of this memory suppression are false either!)Two, the main character is able to deal with her own feelings and discoveries on her own too glibly and easily. I would expect that realistically such knowledge would send someone into such a tailspin that professional counseling help would be needed to help them deal with the "memories" in such an unemotional, neat, compact way as the main character does in this novel. The fact that the main character is able to deal with such "memories" on her own in a simple and easily wrapped-up manner makes it much more unbelievable to me. Perhaps, it was the limit of the number of total words permitted in the novel that made such descriptions considered extraneous. (Giving the benefit of the doubt to the author here.)

Distate of the main theme aside, the book is well-written, interesting, intriguing, with a twist in it as well. Those who don't have a problem with the memory thing, would really enjoy this novel. I generally really like Deborah Bedford and I would consider picking another of her novels up in a jiffy.