Title: Here if You Need Me
Author: Kate Braestrup
When Kate Braestrup's husband, a Maine State Trooper, died in an on-the-job car accident, she fulfilled his dream of becoming a Unitarian Universalist minister, eventually working as a chaplain for the game wardens.
I loved this book! It's short and easy to read, but it shows how a woman and a family who are mourning the man they love (she writes so beautifully and painfully about losing her husband and the first days after his death), turn to helping others, and in the process, heal themselves. It's not cheesy at all, and her story is tragic enough that it definitely could have disintegrated into Velveeta pretty easily. Instead, Braestrup writes frankly and self-deprecatingly and intelligently about her work, her family, and her own spiritual conversion process. It would be a great book group book. I found myself putting myself in her shoes (she had four kids ages 9,7,5 and 3 when her husband died, so it wasn't too much of a stretch) and hoping that I'd be able to handle my trials with as much humor and grace as she does.
1 comment:
Wow--I just read this book last week and I also loved it. I stayed up late to finish it even. Some parts were hard for me, because my SIL was suddenly widowed a few years ago, and I have an aunt who recently lost her husband in an avalanche. So some of the material was a little too fresh. Other that that I loved her insights into the nature of God and love; I especially liked the final story.
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