"The Oak Leaves" by Maureen Lang is a moving book about responding to God when He allows the trial of having a special needs child in a person's life. (view spoiler)[Talie's discovery of an old journal leads her to question whether a "curse" in her great-great-great-grandmother's generation may have manifested in her baby, who is behind norms physically and developmentally. (hide spoiler)] I am an amateur genealogist and I appreciated Talie's search for truth. The story is told in alternating chapters between the historical story and the present day. I felt that the two stories were not paced similarly, and I soon found myself much more interested in the historical story line than the present day one. The author draws on faith, emotion, family, history and genetics (according to the author's note) experience to tell the tale.

Recommended for renaissance-readers who are passionate about special needs kids.