Eventually, he rescues her from the brothel, marries her, and takes her to his farm. Hosea has been told by God that he has to marry Angel, although he is repulsed by the idea of marrying a prostitute. Ten years later, she escapes from Duke and makes her way to California Gold Country, where she meets a man named Michael Hosea. He quickly realizes that nothing could be further from the truth because Duke kills Rab, and then Sarah is initiated into the life of a prostitute herself, even though she is still a child.

Good-hearted Rab thinks he is doing a good thing for Sarah. Rab sells Sarah to a man called Duke, thinking that he wants young girls to adopt as his daughters. Sarah’s mother turns to prostitution as a way of providing for herself and her child, but she soon gets sick and dies, leaving Sarah in the care of her alcoholic friend, Rab. The displaced mistress tries to seek shelter at her estranged parents’ house, but they don’t want any part of her or their grandchild. One day, her father kicks her mother out of the only home Sarah has ever known. Six-year-old Sarah is the illegitimate child of a rich married man and his mistress. I was so glad I did! What’s Redeeming Love about? Redeeming Love actually fit into both the Intentional by Grace and the Unlocking the Past challenges, so I decided to bump it up to the top of the TBR pile. I’m doing three separate reading challenges this year because I wanted to try to increase my reading: one with the Avid Readers of Christian Fiction Facebook group, one hosted by Intentional by Grace, and one hosted by author Crystal Caudill called Unlocking the Past (all about Christian historical fiction). Fortunately, it fit into (at least) one of the reading challenges I’m participating in this year I kept shifting Redeeming Love around, although if I had known all the treasures this book contains inside of it, I never would have let it sit unread for so long. You keep adding to them, and things get shifted around.

It’s been on my TBR pile for a long time, but you know how it goes with TBR piles. That was one of my favorite reads of 2020. It certainly is one of her best, although I really enjoyed The Last Sin Eater. I’m amazed it took me this long to actually read Redeeming Love, one of her most famous books. Moreover, I’ve been a Francine Rivers for quite a few years. I’ve been reading Christian fiction for almost as long. I accepted Jesus as my Savior a long time ago. A book review I don’t know how I went so long without reading Redeeming Love

Redeeming love author