Becoming Mrs. Lewis by Patti Callahan

Young Llama Thoughts
  • Adventurous
  • Christian Friendly
  • Easy Reading
  • Humerous
  • Youth Appropriate
Overall
2.7 Llamas

Review

Hi, I’m the Turtle Reader. (Which is ironic, being as I DON’T read at turtle-pace at all! I just happen to like turtles.) Most of my reviews will be on adult fiction, and almost all will be adult Christian fiction. This book isn’t exactly Christian fiction, although it does feel like fiction, and the characters are struggling Christians. It is actually a historical novel based on the love story of Joy Davidman and C.S. Lewis, the Christian theologian and writer of the Chronicles of Narnia series.

I absolutely loved this book. There was a definite earthiness about the writing style, as the author wrote in first person and channeled the innermost feelings of Joy Davidman. The topics were very adult, so I wouldn’t suggest that anyone under the age of 16 read this book. (This is obviously just MY opinion, but I wouldn’t let Young Llama or Tiger Reader read it yet.)

The beauty of this story lies in it’s pain. Through massive heartache, atheism, war-torn worlds and a search for truth, Joy Davidman and C.S Lewis found true love, although it took them years to come together.

I highly encourage you to read this book and enjoy every word of it, and in doing so, embrace God and His love for you.

 

Pros

  • Excellently written
  • Beautiful love story
  • Definitely Christian-based

Cons

  • Does broach sensitive adult topics
  • Not kid-friendly

From New York Times bestselling author Patti Callahan comes an exquisite novel of Joy Davidman, the woman C. S. Lewis called “my whole world.” When poet and writer Joy Davidman began writing letters to C. S. Lewis—known as Jack—she was looking for spiritual answers, not love. Love, after all, wasn’t holding together her crumbling marriage. Everything about New Yorker Joy seemed ill-matched for an Oxford don and the beloved writer of Narnia, yet their minds bonded over their letters. Embarking on the adventure of her life, Joy traveled from America to England and back again, facing heartbreak and poverty, discovering friendship and faith, and against all odds, finding a love that even the threat of death couldn’t destroy.

In this masterful exploration of one of the greatest love stories of modern times, we meet a brilliant writer, a fiercely independent mother, and a passionate woman who changed the life of this respected author and inspired books that still enchant us and change us. Joy lived at a time when women weren’t meant to have a voice—and yet her love for Jack gave them both voices they didn’t know they had.

At once a fascinating historical novel and a glimpse into a writer’s life, Becoming Mrs. Lewis is above all a love story—a love of literature and ideas and a love between a husband and wife that, in the end, was not impossible at all.

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