Antonia's Choice

by Nancy N. Rue

Toni Wells is a successful churchgoing career woman with full custody of her son. But her commitments escalate as she deals with defiant behavior from five-year-old Ben and takes a niece into her home. Toni cuts her hours temporarily to part-time, terrified of "losing herself completely" to her family. Then she discovers that Ben has been photographed and molested by a child pornographer. Toni must finally make a choice that's not really a "Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it" (Mark 8:35, NIV).

Genres: Christian Fiction, Fiction

304 pages, Paperback

First published May 2, 2003

About the author

Nancy Rue is the author of over 100 books for adults and teens, including the Christy Award-winning The Reluctant Prophet, Unexpected Dismounts and Healing Waters (with Steve Arterburn), which was the 2009 Women of Faith Novel of the Year. She travels extensively—at times on the back of a Harley—speaking to and teaching groups of women of all ages. Nancy lives on a lake in Tennessee with her Harley-ridin’ husband, Jim, and their two yellow Labs (without whom writing would be difficult).

Reviews

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was hard. Hard to think about as a parent, a daughter, sibling, and aunt. What would you do in a situation she has been put in. At first I was angry with her for not realizing her son needed help, but then I could understand how she was blocking it out.

This was well written and thought provoking from many aspects. It makes me look twice at my own situations and making the best choices for my children.

I would gladly read a follow up book regarding Wyndham's journey, Stephanie and the twins, and of course Antonia, Chris, and Ben.

[Karen Britton · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was well written and covered the difficult topic of sexual abuse and molestation and the havoc it creates in a family. Throughout the book, despite the difficulties, God kept showing up to minister to the characters by way of other characters who shared His love in very practical ways. I was very satisfied that the author portrayed the church as coming alongside the victims and their families. It also highlighted the importance of getting help in order to heal.

This is the second of Nancy Rue's books that I have read and I cannot recommend her works enough. She deals with difficult topics with grace and shows how God can redeem His people though they travel through dark valleys. The author practically demonstrates the hope that we have in Christ.

[Robert T. Erhard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Intensely moving. And even more frightening to know that sometimes the worst enemy is who we would least suspect.

As usual, Nancy Rue's book is spellbinding and not in a good way. Written powerfully, the story took me where I never wanted to go, but realized was where I needed to go as a mom and grandmother. Heartbreaking, but the redemption of a family unit at long last is worth the pain of the read in getting there. I couldn't put it down.

[Becky · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was hard to put down. Despite the hard subject matter it was a book that gave hope along the way. It wasn't overly graphic, yet got the point across as to what had happened to the children. I liked that God factored into the recovery process, and the ups-and-downs and length of time involved for them to heal seemed realistic. Nice ending, although I would have liked to know what kind of sentence Bobbie received.

[Bethany · Rating 1 out of 5]

I won't be finishing this book simply because it is full of stuff that is too heavy for me to swallow right now. I don't feel like wrestling through this topic right now. The book makes it too real for me to handle. Also, second heavy book by Nancy Rue that I can't finish in a row. I appreciate that she is trying to tackle big problems, but my brain and emotions can't handle it. I'm done.

[Dawn Jesson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not for the faint hearted! Nancy Rue deals with a very troubling subject & handles it successfully. I love her writing style. Her characters always have a lot of substance & there’s usually a chuckle or two at Nancy’s wry humour.

[Tess · Rating 4 out of 5]

Docking a star because some of the content was hard to read. . .emotionally.

[Tracey J Fox · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a tasteful telling of difficult issues and honesty about the time and effort required in healing. Was a great read.

[Katie Alfonso · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved it.

[Carrie Billig]

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[Grace Lily Creston · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tragic, difficult, too real to love and too tumultuous to ignore.

[Debbie · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Antonia's Choice" is a Christian fiction about the impact of child abuse on children and their families. The horror and hardships involved were vividly described. I hated putting the book down because I wanted to get past the hard parts to a place where there was hope things would get better, but it seemed relentlessly bad-to-worse until the very end.

The book didn't really address some of the hard issues brought up about why God "didn't do anything" to stop the abuse. The answer given was that He'd been telling those involved to stop, but no one was listening until the teenager finally listened and spoke up. This portrayed God as pretty limited--all He can do against evil is plead with rebellious people in the hopes that they will listen and stop? Not true! Also, the Christian therapists seemed to encourage Antonia and abused kids to basically tell themselves that God was good and loved them until they finally believed it. I would have preferred that they had given them the real reasons to believe it.

Yet it's also presented as if God set things up so that Antonia had no choice but to accept the choices He'd set up for her until she gave Him control of her life. Granted, she's told she did have the choice to ignore the problem, but Antonia felt she had no choices. Hey, if every Christian you met was perfectly wonderful, supportive, and sacrificing in order to help you and they really did know exactly the best person (lawyer, therapist, etc.) in the area to help you, then you'd likely feel you had no choice but to go with their recommendations. But that isn't how it works out in real life.

[Val · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not a light read that you take to the beach for pure enjoyment. It can get a bit heavy, due to the intense subject matter. The story concerns a young mom who finds out that her child has been sexually molested by a close relative. It is a story of healing, both for the child and the mom, and a story of restoring relationships with Jesus Christ. As a Christian, I think that part of the story was well done. It was sensitive. My concern would be that a non-believer would not understand how to obtain a personal relationship with Jesus if all they did was read the book. If reading the book led then to the bible, then fabulous! But as a story about the real issue of child abuse, I think it was delicately handled.

[Susan Phelan]

Although pretty well written, this is a subject that was really challenging for me to read about. I had to finish so that I knew everything was "okay." But very tough emotionally.

It did bother me that it took her s long to figure out what was going on and some of it seemed to be written to give the reader information, but not as much as some books I have read.

[Lisa Rathbun]

I had to stay up all night to finish this because I was so caught up in Toni's experience. While the story is not graphic, just thinking about the issue of child abuse and pornography is horrible and seeing her son's anguish is hard to read.



I loved how Toni "lost" everything that had been formerly important to her, but found friendship, renewed love, and strength.

[Diana Sharples · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gripping story showing how child pornography affects not only the innocent victims, but those who love them. I wanted to cry, to wring some necks, to throw the book against the wall for what the characters went through, but I couldn't... because I couldn't put the book down. Nancy Rue handles this controversial subject both realistically and with sensitivity.

[Valerie Teeling · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book with a plot that I couldn't put down! Very well-written. Through Toni's journey in her relationship with God, I was able to glean insights into my Father as well.

[Stephanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

My second book by nancy Rue. Although this was not as revealing and exciting for me as Pascal's Revenge, it still had so many wonderful qualities to it.

[Catherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing!

[Tee Mcdaniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This started out slow but then the story opened up, how does a family survive the abuse that went on among family members so many lifes changed forever .

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Difficult topic. I couldn't put it down.

[Colleen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent Christian book on getting on the healing power of God's love with a son who has been abused in the most degrading way.