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justjoel 's review for:
When I Found You
by Catherine Ryan Hyde
When I Found You was a book that I didn’t think I would like. I’ve read several Catherine Ryan Hyde novels over the past few years, and felt the same at the completion of each. The author also wrote the novel which formed the basis for the movie Pay it Forward, and so far every book I’ve read of hers has a child as one of the main characters.
In this novel, the child is an abandoned hours-old baby found in the woods one morning by a duck hunter’s dog. The man takes the baby home to his childless wife, and wants to keep him, but family comes forward and claims the infant. The man, Nathan McCann, who found the baby, asks only that when the boy is older and has questions, they bring him back to meet him.
Nathan makes a habit of giving the boy a gift each year on his birthday, but stays out of his life until the day the boy (named Nathan after his rescuer) and his grandmother show up at the adult Nathan’s front door. The grandmother informs Nathan that little Nathan, now an unruly teen, is too much for her to handle and she is washing her hands of him.
Nathan opens his home and heart to the emotionally troubled boy, but young Nathan’s choice of actions has devastating consequences that threaten his chance at a happy home.
I almost put down the book fairly early because of young Nathan’s main interest: a sport that my father loved and I hate, and still manage to find no redeeming qualities in. I persisted, though, and ran into a quote in the book which made me glad I had stuck with it: “You can’t tell someone to pursue their dream only if it’s a good match for your own. “
It reminded me of why I read in the first place: to go places I’ve never been, live lives I will never live, experience love, exhilaration, heartbreak, and the totality of human existence through the filter of another lens.
So I stopped begrudging young Nathan his choice of dream, and started hoping he would achieve it.
The book touches on several themes. On the ways in which familial love does not have to involve shared genetics. In the values of perseverance and honesty. In realizing that there are multiple ways to fulfill one’s dreams.
I saw shades of Atticus Finch in Nathan McCann: “I have always felt,” Nathan said, “that the truth is simply the truth. And perhaps does not exist for us to bend and revise. Or even filter to suit the feelings of those we love and want to protect.”
Truth is, I’m glad I read this book. 4 out of 5 stars.
In this novel, the child is an abandoned hours-old baby found in the woods one morning by a duck hunter’s dog. The man takes the baby home to his childless wife, and wants to keep him, but family comes forward and claims the infant. The man, Nathan McCann, who found the baby, asks only that when the boy is older and has questions, they bring him back to meet him.
Nathan makes a habit of giving the boy a gift each year on his birthday, but stays out of his life until the day the boy (named Nathan after his rescuer) and his grandmother show up at the adult Nathan’s front door. The grandmother informs Nathan that little Nathan, now an unruly teen, is too much for her to handle and she is washing her hands of him.
Nathan opens his home and heart to the emotionally troubled boy, but young Nathan’s choice of actions has devastating consequences that threaten his chance at a happy home.
I almost put down the book fairly early because of young Nathan’s main interest: a sport that my father loved and I hate, and still manage to find no redeeming qualities in. I persisted, though, and ran into a quote in the book which made me glad I had stuck with it: “You can’t tell someone to pursue their dream only if it’s a good match for your own. “
It reminded me of why I read in the first place: to go places I’ve never been, live lives I will never live, experience love, exhilaration, heartbreak, and the totality of human existence through the filter of another lens.
So I stopped begrudging young Nathan his choice of dream, and started hoping he would achieve it.
The book touches on several themes. On the ways in which familial love does not have to involve shared genetics. In the values of perseverance and honesty. In realizing that there are multiple ways to fulfill one’s dreams.
I saw shades of Atticus Finch in Nathan McCann: “I have always felt,” Nathan said, “that the truth is simply the truth. And perhaps does not exist for us to bend and revise. Or even filter to suit the feelings of those we love and want to protect.”
Truth is, I’m glad I read this book. 4 out of 5 stars.