Customer Reviews

Watch Over Me

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

When Deputy Benjamin Patil finds a baby girl only a few hours old abandoned in a field, he and his wife Abbi are chosen to be foster parents for her. But, their home is filled with stress and disagreement and may not be the ideal home for this baby. The source of the tension is Benjamin's trauma while serving in Afghanistan. Their lives intersect with a young man, Matthew who suffers from several medical issues and comes from a troubled family. As Abbi and Benjamin continue to take care of the baby, more and more pain is revealed and their marriage struggles to survive.

I have to say I have mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, Christa Parrish is a very gifted writer and storyteller. She is definitely an author I am interested in continuing to read. I found this book to be a bit too edgy for my liking. Now, I usually like edgy books, a lot, but this one just did not agree with me entirely. One reason for that is possibly because of the sexual presence in this story. Don't get me wrong, this book was not trashy or smutty at all, but I just felt it was a bit much for my liking. I also had trouble relating to Abbi and her more liberal tendencies, especially her anti war stance.

I really liked Matthew's part in this story. He was my favorite character and I felt he was a strong presence in this story. His persistent faith and determination were inspiring.

Overall, this book is well written, the story is interesting with very real characters. If you like edgy fiction, this is definitely the book for you.

This book fell completely flat for me. The story strings together a whole series of implausible events bound by characters that are at best, skeletal and at worst, downright unlikeable.

So much went wrong here it's hard to know where to begin. Let's begin with implausible events. One of the main characters, Benjamin, serves in Afghanistan with his lifelong best friend, Stephen. Would the armed forces allow lifelong friends to serve together in the same unit? I doubt it. Ben returns scarred physically and shattered emotionally to his pacifist, vegan wife. Needless to say, there are problems. So it seems plausible that he would, in the line of his detective duty, find an abandoned newborn baby in the woods and bring it home to raise with the wife he hasn't really spoken to in months. Oh, and having a NEWBORN in the home would begin to make things better between the couple!! Sleep deprivation does work wonders for solving marital problems.

So much is left unexplained, and many threads of the story never lead anywhere. Abbi comes from an economically privileged but emotionally barren family. She's liberal and vegan but we don't know why she developed those views. Her obsession with her weight and the corresponding eating disorder might explain the vegan diet, but not her anti-war stance and her extreme environmentalism. Meanwhile, Ben comes from an immigrant family with parents whose marriage was arranged. The significance of that and how it shaped Ben's views about life, family or marriage is never explained. Nor do we truly understand why he wanted to serve in the military.

While the author leaves gaping holes in developing the characters, she smacks us upside the head with a brick with near constant references to Abbi's vegan-ness. Okay, we GET it, that she's unconventional and crunchy without constant reminders. Abbi has a nose ring, wears recycled sari skirts, uses baking soda for deodorant, cloth diapers for the baby, eats carob and cranberry bars, her friend drives a Toyota Prius, she drinks soy milk, and on and on and on and on. What would have been FAR more interesting was understanding WHY she did those things. There are vague references to her views being outside the norm in her church. Why? How did her views shape her experience of Christianity? We don't have any idea, but we DO know what she ate for breakfast.

Then, there are complete contradictions in the story. Abbi's friend Lauren, for example, comes to bail her out of a breakdown. Abbi asks why she's there, and Lauren responds (paraphrasing), "That's the church. We're called to help one another in a time of need. Where else would I be?" This after refusing to speak to Abbi for 13 months because Abbi's husband survived Afghanistan and hers didn't. Seems a pretty sanctimonious statement given their history. It's not that I don't think people can be contradictory, but we don't know how Lauren came to her change of heart because the author only provides a trite explanation during an "all-of-a-sudden" reconciliation scene.

I could go on, but I won't. You get the idea. I didn't like the book. If you read it, I hope you will. There are a whole set of other characters and story lines, including that of the baby, that are more interesting than Abbi and Ben. I won't go into it here so as to avoid spoilers. My interest in the outcomes for the other characters was what enabled me to finish the book.

Abbi and her husband, Benjamin, live in a small town. Ben has recently come home from war in Afghanistan where is best friend was killed. Their marriage is on the brink and Benjamin just can not get over the horror of losing his friend and the blame he places on himself for it.

However, when Deputy Benjamin Patil finds an abandoned infant in a field and then Abbi and him become the baby's foster parents will it help him get out of the pain he is living in? Or will it push him over the edge?

There are a couple of different characters in the book, whose stories are laid out~ however they do cross and mingle.

This story does not necessarily have a happy ending~ which is refreshing. I have been reading many books over the last 6 months or so and 99% of them have fictional happy endings.

However I was disappointed that the author did not dive deeper in to her characters. I got bits and pieces of information about Abbi and Ben, but did not know why Abbi was a vegan, had bulimia, and had an emotionless childhood with her parents. I needed to know more.

My favorite character was Matthew, I would have loved to find out his ending and where is life went past the end of this book.

Parrish's first book Home Another Way was so amazingly original, I didn't think she could top it. But I was wrong.

Abbi, Benjamin, and Matthew are real in their uniqueness, but so is every other character in the book. Parrish masterfully tells an atypical, thoroughly entertaining story, staying away from all kinds of stereotypes--especially with Benjamin. Ultimately, the novel reflects a journey we are all on: what being a mother/father or husband/wife or friend or Christian means in our everyday life.

I can't wait for her third book to release!

Deputy Benjamin Patil has recently returned from a military tour, minus a few toes, and survivors' guilt. Because of his troubles, his marriage has begun to crumble. His wife, Abbi, is at her wits end and no longer knows if she can continue with Ben. When the Deputy finds an abandoned baby, just a few hours old, in an open field he immediately bonds with her. He and his wife Abbi decide to take her in while the case is worked and the police try to find her mother.

There is another story entwined with this one; a story of a deaf teenage boy with serious kidney problems and is in need of a kidney transplant. When his mother gives him up he lives with his worthless Aunt and her 4 daughters. He becomes involved with the Patils and finds what he has been looking for.

The author of this book does an excellent job of drawing you in emotionally and you really start to feel for the characters. This is a touching story centered on faith in God and how He can take the worst circumstances and turn them into blessings. This book is different than most Christian fiction books that I have read, but in a good way. It's not overly sappy or unrealistic. The characters are average people with everyday problems.

I truly fell in love with the struggling characters in Watch Over Me, a novel about loss, need, soul damage, and relationships that heal. Christa Parrish knows how to draw a reader into a complex, emotional, but not overwrought story. Her subtlety is superb. She entices the reader with just enough to want more, painstakingly unfolding the story. Watch over Me opens with a marriage in crisis, a PTSD former soldier struggling with unruly emotions and his peace-loving wife. Distance defines them. When the husband, now a police officer, finds an abandoned baby and brings her home to foster, the fissures in their marriage widen. Woven into that relationship is a deaf teenage boy who desperately needs a family. I loved this book. Loved the characters. Loved everything about it.

"There are thoughts which are prayers. There are moments when, whatever the posture of the body, the soul is on its knees."-Victor Hugo

On a lark I entered a contest on a similar site to Storybuzz called [...]. And was pleasantly surprised to find myself the winner and recipient of two autographed books and a high quality box of chocolates. I was instantly drawn to the cover of one novel titled Watch Over Me by Christa Parrish. It depicted a sweet baby staring directly at the reader over the shoulder of a woman. Cheek to cheek with the baby, the woman's hair in a ponytail, lent an air of fragility to the woman's exposed back and shoulders.

The book opens when Deputy Benjamin Patil, local law enforcement and soldier who survived the Afghanistan war with the loss of his toes and his best friend finds an abandoned baby girl only hours old in a plastic grocery bag by the side of the river.

He and his wife Abbi, who are unable to have children, are chosen to be foster parents for her. But, their home is filled with stress and disagreement and may not be the ideal home for this baby. Between the tension of Benjamin's trauma while serving in Afghanistan and his pacifist, hippie, vegan wife's struggle with an eating disorder and her helplessness in the face of so much wrong between them.

Their lives intersect with Matthew, a deaf teenager, who suffers from several medical issues and comes from a troubled family. As Abbi and Benjamin continue to take care of the baby, more and more pain is revealed and their marriage struggles to survive.

"He heard Abbi come out of the bedroom, the swollen door opening with a sticky pop. Everything swelled in the heat. Problems. Fears. Sins. All puffed with humidity and ready to rain out with the slightest change in air pressure."

Silvia, the abandoned baby brings a purpose into the Patil's life. Named for a Shakespeare's line, "Who is Silvia? What is she, that all our swains commend her? Holy, fair, and wise is she; the heaven such grace did lend her, that she might admired be." As baby Silvia brings Ben and Abbi together in a common cause, they soon learn that she's only a bandage for their lurking problems. And they are forced to ask themselves, if they lose Silvia, will their marriage survive?

Parenting is explored in depth in this story. From Ben's immigrant parents; To Matthew and his cousins being raised fatherless; Through Silvia's abandonment and Abbi's understanding of her dysfunction parent relationship.

Matthew is a precious character and carrying too much on his shoulders in this story. If I talk as though they are real person, it is because Parrish made them seem so to me as I read their stories. Caring for his young cousins as almost a father figure, while navigating through dialysis, he comes into the Patil's life to mow the lawn and care for Silvia when Abbi does her pottery. A strong believer and a math whiz, it is he who must figure out the most difficult equation in the story, who should ultimately parent Silvia.

"In pi he saw the reflection of God. Pi was constant, always the same - today, tomorrow, and forever. It was irrational, like the cross, foolishness to those who didn't believe. It was transcendental; no finite sequence of operations on integers could ever create it. It never ended."

The book does not shy away from heavy issues. Subjects like love, marriage, family, the church, forgiveness, identity and redemption are woven throughout this intoxicating story. Though it explores the bleak moments in life, the story ends hopeful and personal. The reader fully invested not only in the characters but the ability of God to redeem the most unlikely situation...perhaps one in their own life.

GENRE: Realistic Fiction

It was about two years ago that I read a book as depressing as this one. I realize that the strains that problems put on marriage. I realize that our soldiers who are in combat zones for any length of time have huge problems to deal with. I realize that some women have psychlogical problems with weight control and self-worth. But when I read a novel that has all those problems, I would like a tiny bit of comic relief or hope or something to keep me from going to sleep with a heavy heart and no hope. This novel will suck you dry. Christa Parrish also uses some deeply graphic scenes to make a point which I thought were a bit over the top for it to be deemed a Christian novel.

I can get all of this from secular, worldly novels. I don't pick up Christian novels to read stories without hope until the very last page. Life is full of problems and stresses. We Christians find it hard enough to cope with the world without succombing to harsher realities such as this novel depicts. All of this, of course, comes from my personal, emotional response.

The story is well written, however. It is slow with character development, although the protag's friends do provide some wise guidance and a small amount of relief.

This is not a fluffy, Sunday afternoon read. It hits hard which, obviously from the previous reviews, some may truly like.

I am in a book club at my church and this is a book that was chosen. I enjoyed the read.

Christa Parrish's descriptions were just wonderful. The story itself is a great read, but her use of language is marvelous. I haven't read anything that I just sat back and enjoyed the words as they were put together, and not just the story, for several years, as I did with this book. Unexpectedly beautiful.