Finding Grace: A True Story About Losing Your Way In Life...And Finding It Again [Hardcover]

Donna VanLiere (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 31, 2009

Finding Grace is the powerful, often humorous, and deeply moving story of one woman’s journey of broken dreams. It is the story of how a painful legacy of the past is confronted and met with peace. This book is for anyone who has struggled to understand why our desires— even the simplest ones—are sometimes denied or who has questioned where God is when we need him most. This story is about one woman’s unlikely road to motherhood. Finally, it’s a book about the “undeserved gift which is life itself.” It’s the story of “Finding Grace.”

Donna VanLiere has entertained millions with her inspirational stories. In her new book, she gives us a candid look into her own life, a life filled with suffering and pain, but one that ultimately finds peace with itself.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Although many books are called “inspirational memoirs,” too few live up to their label. VanLiere’s is one of the finest. Her life journey got off to a rocky start. Molested twice at a very early age, VanLiere was to face other soul-ripping experiences, including miscarriage and multiple failures with fertility efforts. Somehow, through the steadfast observation of small, everyday things, VanLiere experienced life-altering epiphanies, and she shares these in an open, honest fashion. Her folksy, familiar style makes readers feel as though they’re communing with a close friend. At turns poignant and humorous, her memoir is impossible to put down. Laced with thought-provoking quotations from philosophers and other great minds as well as from the Bible, Finding Grace is never preachy or didactic. It has the same appeal as Rabbi Harold S. Kushner’s excellent book, When Bad Things Happen to Good People (1983). Author of the best-selling Christmas Hope series, VanLiere expresses wonder as she finds joy in the mundane and jubilation in life’s little extras. --Shelley Mosley

Review

First published April 1, 2009 (Booklist).  

Although many books are called “inspirational memoirs,” too few live up to their label. VanLiere’s is one of the finest. Her life journey got off to a rocky start. Molested twice at a very early age, VanLiere was to face other soul-ripping experiences, including miscarriage and multiple failures with fertility efforts. Somehow, through the steadfast observation of small, everyday things, VanLiere experienced life-altering epiphanies, and she shares these in an open, honest fashion. Her folksy, familiar style makes readers feel as though they’re communing with a close friend. At turns poignant and humorous, her memoir is impossible to put down. Laced with thought-provoking quotations from philosophers and other great minds as well as from the Bible, Finding Grace is never preachy or didactic. It has the same appeal as Rabbi Harold S. Kushner’s excellent book, When Bad Things Happen to Good People (1983). Author of the best-selling Christmas Hope series, VanLiere expresses wonder as she finds joy in the mundane and jubilation in life’s little extras.

—Shelley Mosley

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press; First Edition edition (March 31, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312380518
• ISBN-13: 978-0312380519
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #292,854 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Donna VanLiere is a New York Times and USA Today best-selling author and gifted conference speaker. She has published ten titles including The Christmas Shoes and The Christmas Blessing, both of which were adapted into movies (starring Rob Lowe, Kimberly Williams-Perry and Neil Patrick Harris) and garnered big ratings for CBS television. LifetimeTelevision adapted The Christmas Hope (starring Madeline Stowe) and premiered it December 2009 to stellar ratings as well. Donna's non-seasonal novel, The Angels of Morgan Hill, has captured the same warmth as her Christmas books and continues to please loyal and new fans alike.

Donna is the recipient of a Retailer's Choice Award for Fiction, a Dove Award, a Silver Angel Award, an Audie Award for best inspirational fiction, a nominee for a Gold Medallion Book of the Year and was recently inducted into the Ohio Foundation of Independent Colleges Hall of Excellence joining such luminaries as Coretta Scott King, Hugh Downs, Dr. Norman Vincent Peale and Senator John Glenn. Donna is an in-demand conference speaker having appeared at countless women's and family events, including select Women of Faith and Extraordinary Women conferences.

Donna's latest book, The Christmas Journey (October 2010) is a retelling of the story of the Nativity told through Donna's signature voice and accompanied by moving and beautifully rendered watercolor illustrations throughout. The eighty-mile journey of a common carpenter and a simple peasant girl is one of the most powerful stories in history. As books go out of print and stories fade from memory, the journey of Joseph and Mary and her delivery inside a common barn continues to bless and inspire hope in people around the world.

Look for her brand new novel entitled "The Christmas Note this fall (2011).

Donna lives in Franklin, Tennessee, with her husband, Troy, and their children, Grace, Kate and David.

Learn more at www.DonnaVanLiere.com

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Gift of Grace, April 5, 2009

By 

Sam Sattler (Spring, Texas) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Finding Grace: A True Story About Losing Your Way In Life...And Finding It Again (Hardcover)

I have to admit that I was a bit hesitant to accept the opportunity to read and review Donna VanLiere's "Finding Grace." Frankly, I have read very little in the Christian Fiction genre and I watch almost no television, so I was completely unaware of VanLiere's books or the movies made from them. However, I am definitely a fan of memoirs and something about her personal story made me curious to read what she had to say about her life and how she arrived at the point she is today.

"Finding Grace" is an inspirational story - probably more meaningful today even than when VanLiere was writing it, in fact, because of the way people all across the country, and the world, are being tested by the horrible economic crisis we all face. Thousands of jobs are lost everyday, along with the benefits attached to those jobs, such as health insurance, and parents are under tremendous pressure to maintain some sense of normality for their children.

Donna VanLiere shares her own story - and her theory that "broken dreams," the shattering of our expectations of the life for which we believed ourselves to have been destined, are the "launch pad to growth." VanLiere, who suffered sexual abuse at the hands of two perverted young neighbor boys as a child, had her innocence stolen so early that she spent most of her life questioning God about his absence when she most needed His help. As an adult, her dream was to marry and raise a family of her own but her dream plan was shattered by her inability to c0nceive despite spending thousands of dollars and several years trying to right the problem.

It was only when she recognized that God had a different plan for her, adoption, that VanLiere reached what she considers to be a state of grace in her life. Now she wants to share her insights and experiences with others who may be struggling with their own faith as a result of the difficulties they face in their lives. VanLiere's message is one of hope - that when life is at its darkest is the perfect time to open one's heart to an alternative plan, one that just might be what was meant to be all along. VanLiere defines "grace" as "when you get something you don't deserve." It is a gift that you have to do nothing to earn because God wants you to have it, the kind of gift you may not even recognize until long after having received it.

"Finding Grace" will definitely offer hope to those in turmoil about their immediate futures - but it also reminds that life is a long journey with many crossroads, and peaks and valleys, along the way. The most important thing to remember, according to Donna VanLiere, is that it is never too late to accept the grace that is always there for the taking.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Touching memoir about the journey to grace, June 14, 2009

By 

Christina Lockstein "Christy's Book Blog" (Oconto Falls, WI USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Finding Grace: A True Story About Losing Your Way In Life...And Finding It Again (Hardcover)

Finding Grace by Donna VanLiere is a powerful memoir with a message of God and grace in your life. VanLiere was sexually abused as a child and compartmentalized it as her own fault making relationships difficult in her adult life. After facing multiple miscarriages and infertility, along with constant upheaval in her professional life, she finally discovered the gift of writing that God had given her and began the long process of adoption. VanLiere takes all of the bumps in her life's journey and turns them into opportunities for learning, not just for herself, but for the reader as well, who feels like a good friend by the time the last page is turned. As the author of The Christmas Shoes, the author has earned a reputation as a terrific writer, but this book also shows her as a true woman of God who is using her gifts to show His amazing grace.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Moving from Surviving to Thriving, May 6, 2009

By 

WM (Washington, DC USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Finding Grace: A True Story About Losing Your Way In Life...And Finding It Again (Hardcover)

Donna has provided thoughtful, insightful, humorous and authentic reflections on the blessings and challenges of life. Many will find it simply inspirational as she moves from victim to survivor to thriver. Will Marling, The National Organization for Victim Assistance[...]