Resilient Surrender: A Deaf-Experience Suspense Novel

by Peter M. Quint

303 pages, Paperback

Published January 14, 2026

About the author

Peter M. Quint is the author of two novels in the Resilient Silence Series. His books create an accessible pathway for people to examine the struggles, joys and triumphs experienced in the lives of Deaf people. These books also encourage introspection with exposure to characters who face life challenges as they demonstrate various levels of faith and anchors to something bigger than themselves. To guide readers into a more in-depth understanding of Deaf culture, Peter offers companion workbooks with each of his novels.

A teacher of the Deaf and American Sign Language for over 30 years, Peter has infused his novels with characters who exhibit the traits and values experienced in this rich field of experience. He also is a leader in the Christian Deaf community as the founder of Deaf Heartlight, a Christ-based recovery program for Deaf people as well as a founding member of Deaf House Fellowship in the Pacific Northwest region of America.

Peter actively supports Deaf artisans in his work by including illustrations created by a Deaf artist and is involved with the regional Deaf theater organization. Throughout his life, he has participated in Deaf sports, holding the American record for the Deaf in the track and field steeplechase event. He has been a high-level competitor in long distance running events, including a placing in the top 20 of the Bloomsday race in Spokane, Washington state, an event which is featured in his first novel.

Peter currently resides in Aubrey, Texas with his wife Pratibha and their Deaf dog Asha.

Visit peterquint.com. Connect on Facebook peter.quint and Instagram @pmquint5.

Reviews

[Karen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I appreciate Deaf authors writing about Deaf experiences. I appreciated (though I did not really use) the QR codes showing how some of the signs are produced.

However, the characters are really unlikeable with no backstory to support it. Why is Sybil so hateful? How did the adoption process work since Amy keeps saying Sybil snatched her off the streets? Why didn’t Amy try to leave Sybil’s house when she turned 18?

And the fact that all of Amy’s friends seem just fine with helping her flee from the law after brutally assaulting Sybil seems really unlikely and it makes all the other characters unlikable too. And Julius is supposed to be a Christian? It’s certainly not evident in his behavior. He and Amy are both incredibly selfish on their own ways… except that he is inexplicably willing to commit a felony for her and just has an “oh well” attitude about it.

On top of all that, the editing is quite poorly done. There were many errors that made reading the book rather painful.

[Brigitte De Nuit · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book. I really did.
In fact, I wanted to like both Resilient Silence and Resilient Surrender. The premises have genuine promise: Deaf characters, questions of identity and belonging, adoption, family conflict, friendship, romance, and a search for personal history. On paper, there is a compelling story somewhere in here.
Unfortunately, the execution never lived up to the ideas.
My biggest issue was the characterization. Amy spends much of the book consumed by anger, resentment, and self-pity, and I found it increasingly difficult to sympathize with her choices. Rather than taking responsibility for her own life, she repeatedly blames others for her circumstances while making increasingly reckless decisions. By the second half of the story, I wasn’t rooting for her—I was questioning why everyone around her continued enabling her behavior.
The supporting characters were equally frustrating. Several make choices that strain credibility, including decisions that seem wildly irresponsible given the seriousness of the situation. More than once I found myself asking, “Why would any reasonable person do this?”
The writing itself was also a major obstacle. Every book has the occasional typo, but the number of errors here became distracting. Misspellings, spacing issues, incorrect words, and obvious proofreading mistakes appeared so frequently that they pulled me out of the story. At times it felt as though the manuscript had bypassed a final editing pass entirely.
What disappointed me most is that there are interesting themes buried underneath all of this. Questions about identity, family, culture, gratitude, belonging, and self-discovery could have produced a powerful story. Instead, I spent much of my time frustrated with the characters, distracted by the errors, and wishing the ideas had been developed with greater care.
The title Resilient Surrender is fitting in one unexpected way: I had to be resilient to finish it.
I don’t regret reading it, but I do wish the execution had matched the potential of the premise.