Keeping Faith



By Jodi Picoult

Keeping Faith caught my attention because it starts off in a real life drama. Mariah, a mother and a wife, becomes annoyed by her mother who is constantly calling telling her how to run her family which many women and men can relate to today. It also made me want to read more because I have heard many conversations that sound similar to this. Still, I wasn't totally hooked until the drama started.
Mariah is a hard working stay at home mother, who cleans the house, and carts her daughter Faith around town from activity to activity. Colin is a father, and ex-husband to Mariah, who has a cheating problem and isn't delighted with what he had.
Faith is a youthful girl of only seven, whose parents get a divorce. While her mother is grieving, she develops an imaginary friend who tells her to perform healing acts like Jesus once did. She many people that don't believe Faith but on the other hand she many who stand strongly beside her. She has no religious background, but she knows the Bible word for word.
Colin, Mariah's husband, worked on the road and was gone very often. Whenever he called both Mariah and their daughter Faith got giddy inside. Mariah couldn't wait until he got home, because just before they got pregnant with Faith, Colin was caught cheating. On their way to ballet, they decided to stop at Grandma's to pay her a visit. It was raining cats and dogs, and on the way to ballet from grandma's, Faith forgot her leotard. They had just enough time to run home and get it. They saw that Colin was home. Both went sprinting inside. Faith got to the bedroom door first. Mariah went in first. Colin, wrapped in a towel, was out and the shower water was still running, but Mariah didn't think anything of it…then Faith knocked at the door and Colin said, “Come on, honey”…
Little did Mariah expect a dripping wet woman to come out of the bathroom just as Faith ran in. She is in grief while her daughter develops an imaginary friend to help with her sorrow, and also helps others along the road. The characters all had a change in their life, and some didn't deal with it well. But, they all made it threw in the end. With the change of the characters made me feel as if I was in their shoes. Even though you might not have had these things happen in your life, there is something in this book that everyone can relate to.


I recommend this book to any person who enjoys books with a little bit of drama, books that have sense of leaving you wondering more. I can relate to this story because my parents divorced when I was only 3 and to help the pain of not having my dad around I had an imaginary friend that I called Papa. I always remember that because he had many of the qualities that my father displayed and papa was always around whenever I needed him. The lesson I'm learning is not to say that you know about something until you have seen it with your own eyes.