{"id":169,"date":"2009-06-15T11:34:23","date_gmt":"2009-06-15T11:34:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/redletters\/2009\/06\/two-great-reviews-of-scared.html"},"modified":"2009-06-15T11:34:23","modified_gmt":"2009-06-15T11:34:23","slug":"two-great-reviews-of-scared","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2009\/06\/two-great-reviews-of-scared.html","title":{"rendered":"Two Great Reviews of Scared"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two reviews of Scared<\/a> have just come out. One is by, Mary DeMuth<\/a>, an author I highly respect. She's an incredible writer in the fiction and non-fiction department. Get her books, you will love her writing. The second is by CJ Darlington<\/a>, who won the Christian Writer's Guild's Operation Novel Contest. Her review appeared on TitleTrakk<\/a> today. Hope you enjoy reading them:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
Wow.<\/p>\n

Maybe it's because I think I left my heart in Africa, in the northern regions of Ghana. Maybe that's why I loved this book. Or maybe it's because I am deeply saddened by the state of children and women in some of the poorest nations on earth. Or because sometimes I don't feel like I do enough and I need a swift kick in the pants to jolt me out of my American complacency to remember the marginalized. Despite the why, I'm thankful I read Scared<\/span><\/a> by Tom Davis.<\/p>\n

Davis holds nothing back. The reader feels the blow by blow atrocities through the eyes of a reporter who has his own soul issues. We see poverty. Crime. Sexual exploitation. Evil. Hunger. Disease.<\/p>\n

But in the midst of that, we also see the uncanny grace God lavishes on those who suffer, yet bend toward His ear. We see humanity at its best, helping each other, vying to love. And we see sparkling hope in impossible places.<\/p>\n

Such is the reach and scope of this book. Written with sparse, direct prose, Davis is a keen storyteller whose heart for the widow and orphan bleeds onto the page.<\/p>\n

Don't read this book unless you're willing to be haunted, then changed. I promise you both things will happen. And in the midst of that, hope. Blessed hope.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
\n

Scared <\/font><\/strong><\/span>by Tom Davis<\/font><\/h1>\n

Reviewed by C.J. Darlington<\/span><\/p>\n

"Scared<\/em> is the hand adjusting our blurry lense of the world … You\u2019ll visit Africa while readingScared<\/em>. And once you finish, a little piece of Africa will remain with you."<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Here in America it\u2019s easy to hole ourselves up in our cozy little houses with our laptops and iPods, oblivious to rest of the world. Our knowledge of foreign affairs comes from Twitter. If the AC goes out, the coffee burns, or the car won\u2019t start, our day\u2019s ruined. But the truth is that even the poorest in our country would be considered rich in some parts of Africa. What if a bad day wasn\u2019t the barista getting your order wrong but going hungry . . . for five days in a row? What if instead of lying in bed worrying about that presentation on Monday, you worried who would provide for you because your mother was dying of AIDS?<\/span><\/p>\n

At the forefront of Tom Davis\u2019s novel is Stuart Daniels, a washed up New York Times<\/em> photographer who\u2019s thirty seconds of fame came from a photo of dead bodies he shot during a rebel militia raid in Congo. He barely escaped with his life and sometimes wishes he had<\/em> died with the rest of the massacred village. He\u2019s lost his drive, and his editor knows it. Which is why his next assignment in Swaziland could seal his fate. If he doesn\u2019t produce the goods this time, he might not have a career to come home to.<\/span><\/p>\n

Scared<\/em> also features a twelve-year-old Swazi girl named Adanna, and it\u2019s her story that is the hardest to read. Not because Davis\u2019s writing is poor. Exactly the opposite. The writing is so good we feel every moment of the girl\u2019s pain; we hear every longing of her heart. Adanna personifies the emaciated faces we\u2019ve all seen on those tv commercials for relief organizations. How many of us have changed the channel rather than acknowledge poverty, hunger, and disease? Reading Adanna\u2019s story brings the reality front and center. Here, right now, in the 21st century, children like her are suffering through horrors we can hardly fathom.<\/span><\/p>\n

A powerful eye-opener, Scared<\/em> isn\u2019t an issue novel meant to guilt us into action. This is a compelling story first, and I believe Davis meant for Scared to challenge, not condemn. As Americans we\u2019re extremely blessed, but our priorities need to be re-calibrated. Scared<\/em> is the hand adjusting our blurry lense of the world. It also addresses the major question of, \u201cWhy does God even allow this type of suffering?\u201d Says Davis, \u201cIt\u2019s my firm belief that God has already sent the answers to solve the world\u2019s most difficult issues, and the answer is people like us getting involved.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Davis is best known for his nonfiction books Red Letters<\/em> andFields of the Fatherless<\/em>. He\u2019s also the president and CEO ofChildren\u2019s HopeChest<\/a>, a Christian-based child-advocacy organization which helps orphans in Easter Europe and Africa. With all these irons in the fire it\u2019s amazing how well he pulled off writing this work of fiction. You\u2019ll visit Africa while reading Scared<\/em>. And once you finish, a little piece of Africa will remain with you. Hopefully the Scripture, \u201cReligion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world,\u201d will remain with you too. 
<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"ThickerC.J. Darlington<\/strong>'s first novel, Thicker Than Blood<\/em>, was the winner of the 2008 Christian Writers Guild's<\/a> Operation First Novel <\/em>contest. It will be published January 2010 by Tyndale House. When she's not writing, she's reading. Her hobbies include book and art collecting, fly fishing, painting and drawing. Visit her online at her blog<\/a> where she talks about books, writing, and publishing. You can also look her up at Twitter<\/a> and Facebook<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two reviews of Scared have just come out. One is by, Mary DeMuth, an author I highly respect. She's an incredible writer in the fiction and non-fiction department. Get her books, you will love her writing. The second is by CJ Darlington, who won the Christian Writer's Guild's Operation Novel Contest. Her review appeared on TitleTrakk today. 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