Amazing from beginning to end

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	• The Kindness of Strangers Katrina Kittle Harper Perennial, 2007 - 400 pages average customer review:based on 34 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Delicious

A lovely, poignant book about love and friendship--A true gem!
This would make a lovely gift for a sister, mother or good friend! Do yourself a favor and curl up and read this book!

one of my favorites from 2006

THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS by Katrina Kittle
March 16, 2007

Rating: 4 Stars

I actually read this book last year, but never got around to doing the amazon review. KINDNESS OF STRANGERS was one of my favorite books from 2006, a book that some will find the subject matter a little hard to take. It centers on one family, and a boy that they take in because his parents are accused of sexually abusing him. The story is something out of today's sordid headlines, but I felt the author did a good job at telling the story and keeping the focus on the family and the boy, and not on the actual acts that were committed on the boy and many others.

The story begins in the present in happier times. But then the reader is taken back to the past with the story of Jordan, the young boy that is being abused, as well as the story of Sarah Laden and her family, and how they cope with the death of their father. They are already going through a lot before they take in Jordan, a boy they had known for a long time but never knew what went on behind closed doors.

What makes things worse is that Sarah had been best friends with the next door neighbors, and to learn of the possibility of sexual abuse was something Sarah refused to believe.

THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS was such an engaging novel that I finished it one day. The viewpoints alternate between various characters, giving the reader different sides to the story. Well-written with characters that felt realistic and three dimensional, I highly recommend this book.

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Intense, Powerful

This novel does work with powerfully emotional subjects - loss, death, grief, child molestation... But ultimately, The Kindness of Strangers is a novel about surviving the terrible things that happen to individuals and families. Many people may avoid this book because of the subject matter; please don't - it's a beautifully crafted piece of fiction that handles difficult emotions without messy pathos, and shows us characters who move on and thrive after experiencing some of the most terrible things that can happen. I find the "literature of dysfunction" utterly tedious, and Ms. Kittle's novel rises far above that banal genre. Yes, horrible things happen to good people, but a hell of a lot great things happen too.
Another reviewer complained about time inconsistencies, which I have re-checked in the first edition copy at hand. The reviewer apparently didn't realize that the narrator was speaking from a perspective in the future in the opening chapter, which takes place some 12 years after the main plot events. As John Irving wrote, "...you should either stop reading books, or try a lot harder. "

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Amazing from beginning to end

Katrina Kittle can write. In addition to a fantastic plot and expert pacing, she gives us dialogue that reads like the way people really talk. It's particularly refreshing to experience eleven-year-old characters who, though intelligent, actually talk like eleven-year-olds and not like very short adults.

Please don't avoid this book because of its disturbing subject matter. THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS is well worth it.

The Kindness of Strangers

Well, damn, she wasn't kidding. This book was recommended by a good friend/
I will start by saying that the dust jacket certainly does not lend to what the book will be about in full. I have been trying to formulate the words for this spot for a month. I actually read this book before The Bell Jar (#32).

Into your life you let Sarah Laden, recently widowed and raising two sons, on her own, while run her in-home catering business.
Into your life you let sons, Danny and Nate Laden. Danny, a quiet, reserved 5th grader who never [seems] to do wrong. Nate, the older brother and the rebellious teenager, sometimes leaves Sarah with her hands in the air.

Into your life you let Mark and Courtney Kendrick, Sarah's' best friends and neighborhood "neighbors". Courtney a pediatrician and Mark a complete scoundrel, who disappears, the day Sarah finds Jordan home, alone, walking to school in the rain.

Sarah stops by Courtney's and sees Jordan walking to school in the down pouring rain. After a few attempts at ordering him into the car, he submits. While driving to school Jordan appears sick and she pulls over to a rest stop where he vomits and runs to a port-o-john. After many minutes of him not returning Sarah walks to the port-o-john where Jordan does not answer. Sarah opens the door to find Jordan on the floor with a hypodermic needle. The eleven year old appears to have attempted suicide. Sarah rushes him to the hospital, Mark disappears, Courtney is taken away by the police and the entire Laden family is left wondering where to start healing themselves and everyone else in their lives.

A book of healing, love, forgiveness and regret. Powerful, written well, but a tough read do to the emotions brought to the surface, but worth every second.

Outstanding! 5.5

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, page 4, 5, 6, 7

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