Interrupted by Rachel Coker (ARC)

Surprisingly, I really liked this book. Allie, the main character is prickly and perceived to be proud, things that normally make me dislike a character (and since I've read that we dislike in others what we dislike in ourselves, what does that say about me?).

The novel follows Allie through the pre-WWII and WWII years (ages 14, 18 and 20 if I'm correct), although most of it is centered around the time she's 18.

Allie lost her mom to brain cancer when she was 14 (at first, I thought it was Alzheimers), and after that, she was adopted and forced to leave her home. Her mom was fairytale like (likes flowers, stars, myths, etc) and sounds pretty cool, which explains why Allie adored her. It also explains why Allie inherited her mom's hang-ups about Christianity (seeing as her "Christian" father abandoned the both of them). But as she lives with Beatrice (her adopted mother), and meets her childhood friend Sam, her 'heart of stone' starts to melt.

Although Allie is irritable and rude and whatnot, I liked her character. I could understand how she felt, feeling out-of-place. I suppose that's a universal emotion. Her prickliness and everything else was just a defense mechanism (or as another character puts it, a "shell") to stop her from getting hurt. Towards the end, she herself admits as much.

The only problem I had with this book was how it handled Christianity, which was odd, seeing as it's a Zondervan book. A lot of the book focuses on how angry Allie is, and then how she finally admits that's she's touched by the love of Beatrice. But the issue of her father that abandoned her is never resolved, something that should have been, seeing as it's why her mother (and her) hated Christianity so much. For some reason, it felt as though the faith aspect of this book has been placed on the back-burner. Nothing wrong with that, but it felt unsatisfying.

Disclaimer: I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for a free and honest review.