When Crickets Cry

When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a clean, well- written novel with Christian (though not preachy) undertones. The setting: Georgia. The theme: self-forgiveness. It is the story of a little girl who needs a heart transplant, and a man who is the only one who can help her get it. It's about how their lives' intertwine and how they help each other with what they need most.
What I liked about the book:
1- Beautiful quotes from literature throughout the book. Shakespeare, Helen Keller being the most used.
2- The characters. Martin creates a group of very likable, though flawed characters that the reader comes to know and like.
3- The story. It's a good story. It is actually a really good story.
4- The Christian slant of the book. I especially loved the speech the narrator gives to a young man he's befriended who is looking at pornography. It's a speech every dad should give his son.
What I didn't like:
1- Too much tragedy/ conflict. The story just didn't need the tornado. The list includes: tragic car accident, little girl getting hit by a truck, flood, arm to arm transfusions, surgeries with kitchen utensils, man being blinded by a falling accident, and the tornado. I'm sure I'm forgetting some . . . It was just too much. The story didn't need all of that. It really didn't. Had I been editing, I would have cleaned a lot of that out. And while I'm fantasizing about being the editor, I would also suggest that the delightful, precocious seven-year-old girl, was maybe a bit grown up for her age. The author even had her making her own medical decisions. That just wouldn't happen in real life.
2- The author had obviously done much research into hearts and how they work and how they transplant, etc. as well as other medical facts. That should really be in the "what I liked" section, because I did appreciate the thorough accuracy. But I didn't think we needed all the details. I sometimes felt like the story provided a backdrop for the author to spill everything he had learned on us. Again, too much.
Though this book takes awhile to "get into" and to figure out the back and forth from present to past format, it is worth the effort. It is a book of healing and relationships and acceptance: Acceptance of others, of circumstances, and of ourselves. Oh, and as a nice bonus, there's a bit of romance in there, too!


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