Bee’s Gift
Abby’s Letters #2
by Dana Romanin
My rating: 4 / 5
Genre: Christian YA romance
A one-time mistake changes Lindsey Bartley’s life forever during senior year, and she has a lot of difficult decisions ahead of her. Though Richard Hendrick, the man that Lindsey is forever linked to by two lines on a pregnancy test, doesn’t know it yet, his life is about to change for good as well.
I liked this book more than the previous in the series, mostly due to the main character actually being a bit more interesting and dynamic and the loss of the love triangle that permeated the first book. However, though we have moved on to a different character, we don’t move on enough. Part one of two, so half of the book, takes place at the same time as the events in the previous book, and though we see a different side of the story (Lindsey was a side character in the first book with no POV parts), she connects with one of the POVs in the first book (Clark) enough that several scenes are literally re-hashed, word-for-word, from the first book. To be fair, there are minor differences amongst the repeated sentences, though, since a different perspective is shown on the same scenes, but I really think the author should have figured out a way to have a completely fresh take on this second story.
That being said, Lindsey’s character arc, especially her newfound faith in God, drives the first half of the story pretty well. She struggles to decide what to do about her pregnancy, from keeping or discarding, telling the father or not, telling parents or not, etc., and it all felt pretty realistic to me. Except for the way that Lindsey picked up on “church lingo” and prayed fluently for someone else who was struggling, after only attending youth group for a few weeks. There didn’t seem to be much in the way of a learning curve, and it seemed like it could be a bit intimidating for anyone reading the book that is a new believer themselves.
Then part two of the book shifts focus completely from Lindsey to Richard, who was part of the love triangle in the first book. This second half of the book takes us past the time period covered in the first book, into the first summer after graduation for all of these characters, and to a brand-new setting. In a way, it felt like a whole different book, and I wonder if the author perhaps could have started the book here instead. I enjoyed Richard’s arc in this second half, as he grapples with an uncertain future and what his responsibility really is in the life of an unborn child that he has no reason to feel connected to. In the end, the story ends well, probably not much different than one might expect, though there is a bit of a twist thrown in in what feels like an obvious attempt to add drama or excitement. Overall, this book was more enjoyable than I expected it to be, after the first one, and though I’m not sure how accessible it is, I would recommend it for older teens and Christian parents of teens.
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If you’ve read Abby’s Letters, or read it in the future, I would love to hear your thoughts and experiences with this book.
