Emily's Hope.

Emily's Hope Written by Ellen Gable PUBLISHED BY Full Quiver Publishing (PO Box 244, Pakenham, ON K0A 2X0), 2005, ISBN: 0973673605, Softcover, pp. 361, $16.99 CAN

Emily's Hope is a story about a young, teenaged girl growing up in a nominally Catholic family in New Jersey. During her progress towards womanhood, she discovers her own mind about marriage, motherhood, life, and the entanglements of human love. It is this journey that provides the story of this book, the particular tale of one young woman whose story is that of many women growing up today.

This is the tale the book tells, but there is more to this book than just the story. The point of the book is simply this: for young men and women at the beginning of their adult life, happiness here, now, later, and always, depends on being virtuous, an assertion that is in direct opposition to the propaganda we suffer. If it is misery you want in life, if boredom and despair are your goals, then by all means follow the path laid out by television, movies, most modern novels, and Planned Parenthood. But, if you want to be happy, then, as this book makes clear, you must also be good.

When we first meet Emily, the main character of the book, she has the mind of a typical girl; her ideas which she defends as her own are in reality a jumble of half truths learned from her teachers and friends: values instead of virtues, and prejudices masquerading as original thoughts. All her opinions are simply those she has acquired from the culture without any thought as to their real meaning--she claims to be pro-choice by default, believes that birth control is the responsible choice, and that sex has little to do with marriage. That is, Emily is a product of a modern North American education, a product as predictable as every other product spit out of an assembly line.

After Emily leaves high school, her history begins to differ from that projected for her by upbringing, largely because young Emily begins to think about her life with perception. And, most importantly, Emily never stopped praying or going to Mass. This might strike some readers as curious in such a secular girl, but this is one of the most realistic insights the author provides us with, the imperceptible movement of grace which is at work below the consciousness.

Emily's own story becomes involved with her search for her past which begins as a school history project. Emily is given a ledger which was her great-grandmother's, in which there are odd notes written in some kind of private shorthand. As Emily goes through the process of trying to chose a good husband from among the variously immature and amoral young men in her world, the author tells us a parallel story of Emily's great-grandmother at these same stages of her life, a life burdened by the tragedies that accompany her own wantonness.

Our insight into the great-grandmother's life lends the story of Emily a sense of urgency, and we rejoice with each decision that distances Emily's own history from that of her past. In this, the author provides a valuable insight into how our seemingly minor day-to-day choices determine the shape of our lives in the future. The title, Emily's Hope, refers to the moment that Emily realizes that through faith she can hope for the forgiveness of her ancestor's sins, sins that robbed Emily's family of so much good.

There is a wonderfully insightful passage which describes the state of mind of newly married couples: "...she began to resent the effectiveness of NFP. She found it ironic when she remembered how little she trusted the method in the first six months of marriage." Emily, like any normal young wife, wants to have children, in contrast to her great-grandmother and everyone else in her world who have accepted artificial sterility as normal.

I would encourage everyone to read this book, certainly young women. The subject matter is perhaps too strong for younger readers, dealing as it does with artificial contraception, abortion, and all the horrid realities that accompany our culture's degeneracy. Nevertheless, the author is always careful to make her text respectful. It is a book I can wholeheartedly recommend.