Hope in Patience [Hardcover]

Beth Fehlbaum (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 27, 2010

Fifteen-year-old Ashley Asher has spent half of her life living in fear. Her stepfather has been sexually abusing her for years, but her mother doesn't believe her. After his latest assault lands her in the emergency room, Child Protective Services finally removes Ashley from her home, and sends her to live with the father she barely remembers and his new family. Her new life in Patience, Texas, is much better. She's in therapy to deal with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and is trying to make her way in a new high school. She's getting used to living with her father, stepmother, and stepbrother, and she's made new friends in the summer course taught by her stepmother, Bev. She even joins the track team at the urging of her new African American friend, Z. Z. But Ashley is so traumatized by her past that she sometimes scratches herself until she bleeds and sleeps in her armoire, even though she knows she's safe now. Worse, when her stepfather is finally put on trial for hurting her, she learns that truth and justice don't always go together. Will Ashley adjust to a better life? Will she trust enough to date Josh, the cute guy on her track team who likes her? YA readers will be caught up in the heart-pounding story of a damaged girl trying to heal herself and get on with the rest of her life.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 8 Up—Ashley Asher lives with her father and stepmother in a tiny town in East Texas. She wants what any 15-year-old might want: friends, a supportive family, a special relationship with a boy. But Ashley struggles to stop harming herself, to stop dissociating, to accept the support of the people around her. Before she came to Patience, Ashley spent most of her childhood with an indifferent mother and an abusive stepfather. Now she faces the huge challenge of healing from emotional neglect, as well as sexual and physical abuse. She tries, but trust is so hard to come by. And the challenges keep coming. There's a court date when she must face her abuser and the mother who rejects her for reporting the assaults. And a first date on Halloween turns into a disaster when an actor playing a ghoul triggers a posttraumatic reaction in Ashley. All this is tough stuff, but very real to anyone who has lived with abuse or suffered from PTSD. The author is to be applauded for her courageous and accurate portrayal of the many small steps that lead toward psychological healing. It is Ashley's friendships with other "misfits," as much as the support of her new family and her unconventional therapist, that help Ashley understand that she is not alone and that she, too, deserves love. Teens who are attracted by her honesty and her compelling story will come away with a deeper understanding of trauma and healing. This book will open hearts and might well save lives.—Carolyn Lehman, Humboldt State University, Arcata, CA
(c) Copyright 2011.  Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

From Booklist

This follow-up to Courage in Patience (published in 2008 as a book for adults) finds 15-year-old Ashley trying to make a fresh start with her father while still haunted by the sexual abuse of her stepfather. With all sorts of help, Ashley begins the difficult, sometimes painful journey toward finding the courage and confidence to begin real healing. The book’s strength lies in its intimate portrayal of the impact of abuse and PTSD, and Ashley’s emotions almost always ring true. Some intense, graphic scenarios appear here, including Ashley’s descriptions of her physical abuse and her occasional self-mutilations. Grades 10-12. --Shelle Rosenfeld

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 312 pages
• Publisher: WestSide Books; First Edition edition (October 27, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1934813419
• ISBN-13: 978-1934813416
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #387,928 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Check out my website, http://bethfehlbaumbooks.com, for chapter previews, my bio, all the latest news on THE PATIENCE TRILOGY, teacher/librarian resources, and my media room!

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A story of recovery, not abuse November 14, 2010

By Lawral Wornek

Format:Hardcover

This is a harsh story, and my heart broke for Ashley over and over again while I was reading it. It is not a book that will be immediately accessible to a wide audience. It is a book that shows how one young woman is able to overcome years of sexual and emotional abuse with the help of some solid family and friends, and as such, it it has the power to provide exactly what the title suggests, hope, if it gets into the right hands.

Ashley's abuse at the hands of her step-father is definitely a focal point of Hope in Patience, even though it is all in the past at the opening of the book (though it does still manage to be graphic in places). Her mother's emotional abuse, however, manages to still reach Ashley in Patience and still tear Ashley to bits. It is that, more than facing her step-father at trial that puts up roadblocks on Ashley's road to normalcy. It is also what makes it so hard for Ashley to trust that her father and step-mother really love her, want her around, and have her best interest at heart.

Ashley's scared, kind, bold, shy, and overly aware of herself in the way that folks in therapy often are. And she's funny. And not broken. Fehlbaum, in Ashley, has managed to show that a person can go through hell and back, be totally and in some ways irrevocably scarred, and still not lose what make them them. Ashley displays fierce loyalties to her friends, K.C. and Z.Z. especially, even when she's struggling to hold herself together. And they do the same for her when she needs it the most. And there's Joshua. He's cute, he's on the track team, and he like Ashley, which in a lot of ways terrifies her. Learning to trust him with all of her issues is the Big Thing in this book. It's the Big Problem and also the Big Indication of Growth. It's also really sweet.

Hope in Patience is ultimately about how Ashley grows out of the shell that years of abuse put her in. It is the powerful story of how she stops being Ashley-who-was-abused and becomes just Ashley.

Book source: ARC provided by the publisher.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Review from Blkosiner's Book Blog November 4, 2010

By brandileigh2003

Format:Hardcover

Hope in Patience is a very powerful and emotional story of surviving molestation and abuse. I devoured it and even though it was not an easy read (meaning it deals with sensitive issues) it is one that I would recommend.
The main character Ashley is portrayed in a very believable light. I appreciate how Beth (the author) did not make her problems magically disappear, but really showed her process to accepting what happened to her, learning how to deal with it and the resulting emotions, and how to heal. This in reality is a very hard road, and the book depicted that.
This book addresses fear- of the known and unknown, learning how to accept differences, and how to respond to them and to the fear that drives us. There are characters from all walks of life- religious, abused, homosexual, and prejudiced, and they all play roles no matter big or small in Ashley's recovery.
Hope in Patience is a telling of Ashley's coming of age, so to speak, coming to terms with herself, learning to stand up for herself, to love herself, and to become her own person.

Review from Blkosiner's Book Blog at [...]

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars BookWhisperer Review: Hope in Patience November 12, 2010

By J. Omullane

Format:Hardcover

Hope in Patience is a brutally honest story about one young girl survival from a life of abuse. This story was truely an eye opening experience for me. While my career has allowed me knowledge about tragic crimes. I was not aware of the struggle to survive after such a crime. Ashley Asher is the main character that has experience a life of sexual abuse at the hand of her step father Charlie. Ashley is a very strong child, but it is amazing to see the loyalty that this child holds for her mother after a life of rejection. It is astounding to me that parents like this exist. It is a dispicable act for a parent to ignore the cries of their own children to keep a man or a woman. Furthermore, it is sickening that children are living in situations like this everyday. One thing I must note was I found a portion of this story a bit confusing. After Ashley is removed from the situation the story jumps to the trial for Charlie in the breaking of Ashley's arm; at no point in the story does it tell the reader why it is that Charlie got off on the original charges. This young girl was raped and sexual abused for years how in the hell does that not spell out GUILTY. I wish that the story filled the reader in on why this perpetrator was released from that charge in the first place. Even though I found this to be confusing it did not change the outcome of this story or really vary my feeling toward this book. I wish I had a little bit more information, but I love the story regardless. I am grateful for parents like David and Bev. Ashley's post trauma character is very unstable and confused; parents such as these are hard to come by, but the truth is their are people this wonderful. I feel that they are the saviors of this story, and without them Ashley would have had not progressed as quickly or as drastically by the end of this boo. Especially Bev being a bit of an outsider, not being Ashley blood relative, she seemed to recieve the majority of negativity from Ashley. Throughout, it all not once did she give up or lash out. She was a constant supporter of Ashley, and I feel her life saver. All in all this is a story of a SURVIVOR. It is empowering and an eye opening experience that I truely enjoyed.