Into the Fire

When an author chooses to address death as the primary plot point in fiction, there is always the risk of what we tend to term “melodrama”. One definition of melodrama states its meaning as follows: a dramatic presentation characterized by heavy use of suspense, sensational episodes, romantic sentiment, and a conventionally happy ending. However, many times a negative connotation is attached to this word when applied to writing or film. Maybe the reason we do this is precisely because of the amount of drama required to pull it all off in one book or movie. On the positive side of melodrama, when it’s fully accomplished and done well, the book or movie is usually a stunning success.

This week’s featured novel for the CFBA Blog Tour Crossing Oceans by Gina Holmes, published by Tyndale House, captures plenty of the elements of melodrama, and in the vein of Nicholas Sparks, as far as accomplishing the heart-wrenching effect of gut-level circumstances requiring emotional investment, Gina’s story clamps its grasp around the heart and squeezes. Hard. My first tears came at page 90-something and intermittently from there on through to the end. It’s important to note here that these tears aren’t coerced from the writing but from the involvement with and the reality of the characters’ pain.

I’m going to do this review backwards and continue to discuss the technical aspects of Crossing Oceans first. This novel reads so smoothly, so easy and quickly, and in spite of the overused dysfunctional family—we all seem to include them in our stories—Gina captures the underpinning of love, loss, pain, and misunderstanding with a natural tone which invites us into this family’s sorrow and struggles. Gina’s clever and sensitive voice dominates this first person account and explores the gamut of injury waged by family members and young lovers through the eyes of a young single mother facing her life’s end. Within this framework, God hovers—His influence, His gentle interference, His dramatic intervention, and His sovereign will imposed on each member of this story with or without their permission.

Anyone who’s lost someone close to cancer recognizes the effects of the disease, and besides the evidence that Gina’s “other” career is nursing, the author dispenses the symptoms and fears of the disease and its end result with clinical accuracy and spiritual honesty. As heartbreaking as dying can be, in this story the reward of faith in our Lord overtakes the recurring doubts and buries them once and for all before the last breath comes.

Crossing Oceans tackles the story of a young single mother estranged from her widowed father seeking to find a family to raise her five year old daughter when she dies from the cancer which will shortly end her life. Having to present his only grandchild to her father for the first time and to reveal her existence to the child’s father, conceived from their high school affair after the death of her mother, Genevieve (Jenny) Lucas comes home to address the ghosts of her past.

Jenny Lucas is a bit of a spitfire, not quick to forgive, but lives to provide the best she can for her daughter Isabella. Unwilling to think the “best” could possibly be the child’s actual father, the self-absorbed ex-boyfriend and his doting wife Lindsey, she contends with her own family, an old school friend who offers her more than she could hope for, and the ultimate sacrifice required for her daughter’s provision.

Gina excels at carefully depicting the confusion of a precocious child trying to adjust to things she can’t understand, and the resulting circumstances provide a certain healing which seems to that point unattainable.

Up to the “conventionally happy ending” part in the previous definition of melodrama, Crossing Oceans fulfills the meaning of the word. The ending is a “must happen” and in the positive sense a satisfactory conclusion to the story.

Gina Holmes gives a first-rate effort in her debut novel Crossing Oceans. The reader will be moved to tears multiple times but will not regret the experience of being touched by this meaningful novel. 

Father, you’ve watched Gina all through this journey. You knew her struggles and you knew where they would ultimately lead her. I pray you would continue to be her focus along the way of writing just as you’ve always been. I pray her faith is strengthened by the outcome of her efforts. Bless her, Lord Jesus, with your hope and the encouragement of the plans you still have for her. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.