Customer Reviews

Words

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I downloaded Words simply because it was free. I put off reading it because I was intimidated by the subject matter, but I read through all my other quick, fun books, and I had nothing left to read, so I started it . . . and finished it the next day (despite working an eleven hour shift).
I lost track of how many times it had me in tears. Sometimes not pretty tears. I smiled. I cried. I wanted to (and sometimes did) call my best friend and/or my sister to tell them how much I was loving it along the way.
I read probably a book or two every week, but I don't remember the last time I've been so wrapped up in a story. I felt like I needed to send the author a thank you note. I wish I could go back and pay for it.
Haunting. I'm still thinking about the characters, wondering how they are. I couldn't recommend it more highly.

"I can't talk. I can't breathe. Tears choke me."

That's exactly how I felt when I read the last page of this book. I'm thrilled to have received a review copy of such an astounding, debut novel. I haven't read anything this profound, inspiring and life changing since Redeeming Love and June Bug. The author is a master wordsmith and trusts the readers' imagination to fill in the blanks about the abuse Kaylee endures and talks about it without being graphic. Ginny L. Yttrup has overcome sexual abuse in her own life, is compassionate towards its victims and has penned a story filled with healing and hope. Ginny shows the reader a way to shine the light of Jesus in the darkest places of life in a real way.

Kaylee is a ten year old girl fascinated by words. Words are a colorful protective shield she uses to give her hope and clarify things she doesn't quite understand. Kaylee is a bright and loving child surviving day after day anticipating her mother's return.

I enjoyed Ginny Yttrup creative writing style. It was fun to read and had a powerful impact to the story, for example Kaylee says, "my favorite C word - co-loss-al. It means awesomely huge."

She uses it to describe the colossal redwood trees she loves. The tree is her special place to hide her earthly treasures and new words. The author's style adds richness to the novel and gives Kaylee a distinctive way of expressing herself.

"I'm so hungry I could eat the scrambled egg in one bite. Instead, I try to make it last, make it seem like more. I take tiny bites. I think of a word that I added to my box this week.

Sa-vor - verb 1) to perceive by taste or smell, esp, with realism 2) to give oneself to the enjoyment of: savor the best in life.

Yes, I savor each bit of my eggs."

This author's unique voice allows the reader to experience and see the healing power of love in action. This book is not preachy but potent. The message is clear "Jesus is the word - the most important word"

Ginny had me going in parts of the story I thought I had figured out, and threw in twists I didn't see coming. Parts were surprising, suspenseful and I found myself nervous for the characters. This book is quite an experience, one you'll never forget and don't want to miss. This novel is one of the reasons why I read and promote Christian Fiction. I highly, highly recommend it. Treat yourself to reading Words. I don't know where Ginny will go from here but I'll be following.

The Book Club Network [...]

This was such a powerful book. Kaylee Wren is a young ten year old girl abandoned by her mother. She is left with her mother's boyfriend. When the mother doesn't return the boyfriend burns all of the mother's possessions and most of Kaylee's things. She is left there for him to do with as he pleases, and he does.Kaylee clings to a dictionary and two other books left by her mother. Two books "he" doesn't know she has. She has stopped talking. She keeps her words in her head. This is the one place he can not find them and take them away. She is a survivor. As I read I wondered how she was still alive. She was hungry and dirty. She holds out hope that her mother will come back for her. She even tells her self that her mother has amnesia. This is how she deals with the situation.The imagery and use of metaphors is wonderful. The author uses the redwood tree and its resilience to explain how Kaylee is a survivor. In the story, when Kaylee can steal away from the cabin, she hides in the base of a redwood tree. She keeps those things she holds most dear in that tree. It is here that Sierra, an artist, finds her. The meeting of these two is not by chance. Sierra is dealing with the anniversary of her own daughter's death. Twelve years earlier she had given birth to a daughter who lived only nine days. Drugs she took while pregnant was the root cause of her daughter's death. Sierra has been running from the pain and from God for a long time. With Sierra's painful past, and Kaylee's current pain, only God could bring two dysfunctional people together to show how God can heal. Kaylee uses words to protect her and help her heal. Seirra dives into her art. She talked about building layer upon layer, yet after Kaylee entered her life she begins to peel away layer after layer of her past.It is proof that a person must deal with the past instead of holding it in, if they are to ever begin the healing process. Forgiveness must be given for complete healing. We see both Kaylee and Sierra dealing with their past. We also see that they have learned that dealing with their past through God's helping love is so much easier. This is a book I highly recommend. Don't let the topic of sexual abuse scare you away. The messages of hope, forgiveness, redemption and love are more than enough to combat the scary topic. This powerful book will take you on a rollercoaster ride you will not soon forget

Kaylee Wren is almost ten years old, but she doesn't speak. Abandoned by her mother, she lives with her mother's boyfriend, an alcoholic who sexually abuses her. Kaylee is fascinated by words, and even though she can't speak she reads her mother's dictionary cover-to-cover, beginning to end, over and over again. Memorizing words and meanings.

Sierra Dawn is an artist and alone. Twelve years ago she was addicted to drugs and the rough lifestyle associated with it and ended up accidentally killing her baby girl. She still mourns the loss of her child. Trying to help her become clean, Sierra's parents spend their savings renting an ocean-front cabin far away from the city Sierra lived in, breaking her from her friends, from her sources, from her drugs.

On the twelfth anniversary of her baby's death, Sierra drives out to the cabin, and there she sees Kaylee for the first time. She thinks she's imagining her, but still tells her best friend, Ruby, about seeing the child. Sierra's world begins to crumble but she still reaches out to Kaylee when she sees her again. Can God help these two hurting souls to heal?

WORDS is a powerfully written story about two hurting individuals who came through the ugly side of life and survived. Dealing with tough subject matter, this is not a book for those who prefer to read "feel good stories". This is a book that will make you think, that will make you want to reach out to the druggie on the street, to the hurting child in an abusive home, and help them find God's love in the midst of their private Hell.

If you like reading books that deal with the gritty side of life then you will want to read WORDS. This is written in first person, both Kaylee's and Sierra's, but it is easy to tell who's point of view your in. Recommended.

This is one of the best books I have every read. When people wonder why others that are suffering abuse(especially children)do not tell anyone, READ THIS BOOK, and you will understand why. It is a world that most of us pray to never know. This book will give you an understanding of that world that so many suffer. You will fall in love with this child. You will cry with her, laugh with her and rejoice with her, but most of all you will understand her and the world in which she lives. You will not put this book down once you start it. Read it, you will be glad you did.

From the first page of Words, Kaylee Wren, the ten-year-old girl at the center of this story, captivated me. With her expansive vocabulary and manners that would make Emily Post proud, Kaylee is the most endearing fictional character I've encountered in a long time. In fact, I would say that creating memorable characters is one of Ginny Yttrup's greatest strengths as a writer. Sierra, Ruby, and Pete are all unique, likable, and expertly developed throughout the novel.

Words consists of sixty-two bite-sized chapters that alternate between voices-primarily Sierra's and Kaylee's. There are a few chapters written from the perspective of Kathryn, Kaylee's mother, but unlike the rest of the book, these are written in the third person. I think this switch from first to third person and back again disrupted the flow of the story the few times it occurred in the second half of the book. Because I had grown used to reading in the first person, I found it a little confusing when the narrative suddenly shifted. Fortunately this only happened a handful of times.

My only other complaint was that Sierra kept called Kaylee "Little One" throughout the story. This really threw me off at first and it seemed out of character for Sierra I had gotten to know. Of all the pet names for a ten-year-old child, this is perhaps the most irritating. After a while I started to skip over it in the text, as though Sierra never said it. I think this was the most glaring fault of the novel, and it stood out so much in part because just about every other aspect of the book was so darn good.

Words addresses the uncomfortable and all-too-real topic of child sexual abuse. Evidently a survivor of abuse herself, Yttrup handles this theme delicately. She does not gloss over the horror of such abuse and the lasting trauma it inflicts on its victims, nor does she come at all close to being graphic. This treatment of such a sensitive subject will hopefully serve to educate readers about the signs and consequences of abuse, which could in turn lead to the saving of a child's life.

Yttrup also did a brilliant job of presenting the gospel message in a reader-friendly way. I find that Christian novelists in general usually make one of two mistakes when discussing God and the gospel: Either they go overboard and preach a sermon that will most certainly send unbelieving readers running for the hills, or they tack God onto the plot as an afterthought, a sort of genie in the sky that doesn't even fit well within the context of the story. (The latter is decidedly more common.) There are stories that lack God, there are stories that try to stuff too much of God into too small a space, and there are stories that naturally breath grace-stories where you can almost feel God's heart beating behind them, even when he is not directly being talked about. Without a doubt, Words is a Grace-Breathing story.

My conclusion? Words is a beautiful story of healing and redemption, one I would recommend in a heartbeat.

SENSITIVE SUBJECT MATTER.
WELL WRITTEN.
WILL READ OTHER WORKS BY THIS AUTHOR.
WOULD LOVE TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE KEY CHARACTERS. A SEQUEL WOULD BE GREAT.

From the beginning to the end this book will captivate your heart.
You'll be torn with the pain of the words on the page and then transported with the joy ! You'll ache with love for Kaylee and Sierra. You won't be able to put the book down and then regret reading it so quickly, as you didn't want this magnificent masterpiece to come to the end. Kaylee, Sierra and Pete became so embedded in my heart that I longed for more.
Ginny Yttrup is an amazing artist! She paints horrific and then breathtakingly beautful pictures on the printed page. She is truly a wordsmith! She has gifted us with a masterpiece with her "WORDS". This is her first of three books. The second one, "Lost and Found" will be out soon and I can't wait. I read a borrowed book, but have now purchased three. This exquisite book is too good not to share !

Story Description:

I collect words. I keep them in a box in my mind...I'd like to keep them in a real box, something pretty, maybe a shoe box covered with flowered wrapping paper. Whenever I wanted, I'd open the box and pick up the papers, reading and feeling the words all at once. Then I could hide the box. But the words are safer in my mind. There, he can't take them.

Ten-year-old Kaylee Wren doesn't speak. Not since her drug-addled mother walked away, leaving her in a remote cabin nestled in the towering redwoods - in the care of a man who is as dangerous as he is evil. With silence her only refuge, Kaylee collects words she might never speak from the only memento her mother left behind: a dictionary.

Sierra Dawn is thirty-four, an artist, and alone. She has allowed the shame of her past to silence her present hopes and chooses to bury her pain by trying to control her circumstances. But on the twelfth anniversary of her daughter's death, Sierra's control begins to crumble as the God of her childhood woos her back to Himself.

Brought together by Divine design, Kaylee and Sierra will discover together the healing mercy of the Word - Jesus Christ.

My Review:

I have never read a more sad story of abuse and have never felt so close to a character as I did little Kaylee Wren. What a beautiful, innocent little girl whose life circumstances have thrown her into a world of silence.

Kaylee was only 9-years-old when her mother, Kathryn, left her leaving her all alone with a horrendous man who lords his power over Kaylee and turns her into his own private play toy. Kaylee likes to collect words that she finds in a dictionary that was given to her parents as a wedding gift. Kaylee and her Mom used the dictionary often to look up words they didn't know or understand. The dictionary makes Kaylee feel like part of her Mom is still there with her and takes special care of it so "he" won't find it and take it away from her.

When Kaylee meets Sierra, an equally damaged soul, the two of them form a bond of trust, respect, love, and the belief that together they can conquer all things through Jesus Christ. However, the road to healing is a long and exhaustive one that comes with many, many pitfalls that must be traversed forward and sometimes backwards before moving on to a higher understanding of their positions and circumstances in this life.

The characters were so well developed in this story that I felt I was living with Sierra and Kaylee and could picture in my mind's eye the house, Kaylee's bedroom, Van the dog, their backyard and everything else involved in this story. My emotions were played like a flute in a concert while reading this book and it's a story I won't ever forget. The unfortunate part is that there are many, many Kaylee Wren's in this world and not all of them are fortunate enough to find someone like Sierra. It breaks my heart to think of the number of children, who at this very moment while typing this review, are being abused in some form. Abuse, whether it be physical, sexual, verbal, financial doesn't matter, abuse is a cancer in our society and I pray that someday it can be eradicated. No one deserves to live a life of abuse and the damage and fear it causes. This book really touched my heart and to the author, Ginny L. Yttrup, I'd like to say "thank you" for having the courage to write WORDS, your own life story but injecting Kaylee as the character instead of yourself. I'm sorry for the horror you faced as a child and I wish you all the best in your future endeavours.

I got this book as a Kindle freebie and am now buying the book so that I can share it with others. This subject matter is not something that I would usually pick up to read but I am soooooo glad I did. Wonderfully written, it kept me captivated, and sooo insightful.