When Crickets Cry

Another book review for ya...last night I finished 'When Crickets Cry' by Charles Martin. At first I wasn't impressed with this book, this might be confusing but I will try to explain. I am a Christian, I believe in God I don't believe in the Church. I also believe that each of us are entitled to our believes and am not huge fan of people trying to push their religion on me. I don't have an issue with religious books but they have to flow properly. At first I thought this book just threw in Bible verses just whenever and after reading it I still have that opinion, some of the verses in the book seemed to fit but others just seemed to be there and I am still not sure what the purpose was. There are many God references in this book and most of them in the right places.

Once you get past the overly religious references the story is a major tear jerker. The book is mostly about a man and his life, and journey to find out who he really is. As a young child he connected with a young girl who had a heart condition, and they remain together for their lives, well atleast until her passing. Throughout his life he does everything he can to figure out how to heal the human heart, and becomes a world famous heart transplation expert, but still can't figure out how to heal the human heart.

After his wife's passing he spends years running from his demons and hiding behind a wall, with his brother-in-law standing by his side. One day he meets a little girl with the same problem with her heart as his wife had and they begin a journey that not only brings him back to the world of medicine but also teaches him that no medicine in the world can cure a broken heart. He can cut a heart out of a dead person and sew it into a dying patient but they can still have a broken heart. And even though his heart is the healthiest around it can still be broken.

It is a great story as I said if the religious references don't bother you (as for some people they are an issue), there are a few things that seem out of place to me but for the most part it is very well written. I started this book just a couple of days ago and found myself reading over 200 pages last night to finish it...probably why I woke up with a migraine :) Many lessons can be learnt from this book but it is mostly about being able to forgive yourself your mistakes and know that no one is perfect. That life is about living and seeing things through your heart and not just your eyes...guess I forgot to mention his brother-in-law is blind...but I won't go into details. In the book he states a couple of times that even though heart transplantation is a hard life to live, with lots of pain and a lifetime of medications people line up to have their hearts cut out with the hope for a new life. But it seems that these people, the ones who need a new heart, they are the ones that can actually see life for what it really is, they can see the beauty in things that most of us just look past.

Another great book. Another one I would recommend.