Once in a while you come across a book with a story that just seems too interesting to not read. That’s what happened for me with this novel. When I read the premise of it, I couldn’t stop thinking about it for a few days. It reminded me of The Incarnations, which was an amazing read, but it was also very very different from that novel. I knew I had to give it a shot and so I did. And now, here is my review.
What do you do when you child keeps asking to go home to his real mother? Janie is a single mother with a precocious young son named Noah. Every day, he asks her to take him to his real Mommy, a request that scares and baffles her. He is her biological son and she has no idea why he keeps insisting that this is not their home. As if this wasn’t disturbing enough, Noah has intimate knowledge of things that Janie has never shown him or talked to him about. When all the doctors fail to diagnose him, she turns to Dr. Jerome Anderson, a professor who studies cases just like Noah. What began as a way to resolve Noah’s issues soon turns into a journey that Janie could never have imagined.
If I haven’t given enough hints yet, this is a story about reincarnation. I don’t think that’s really a spoiler because it is obvious from the very start. What I enjoyed about this novel was the emotional depth that the author portrays. Dealing with an unnatural phenomenon like the one depicted in this story is emotional enough, but when you throw in a mother’s love for her child? You know it’s going to be powerful when that happens. And it is. Guskin weaves accounts of real cases into the story and makes the reader question everything they know about life, death, and the afterlife. If you are looking for a poignant and deep novel, then this is the one for you!
Readers, I really hope you give this a shot! It may be more emotional and not as action-packed as a dystopian or a thriller but it is fantastic in its own right and worth giving a shot.
Happy reading ~