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Innocents Pray
Justice, mercy, and humbleness collide when four people pray for different answers to the same situation. How will God answer all of them?
What is wrong with trying to cure cancer? Brother Able, hospice chaplain, asks himself that question every day. His boss, Dr. Rich Bernard, performs closet genetic experiments at Paradise House. He blackmails Able into keeping his secret. When a grieving husband asks Able to pray for his dying wife, Able finally breaks his silence.
Libby Davis might be prepared to accept death, to sacrifice herself for Rich's greater cause but fails to comprehend the love of a husband who cannot let her go and the son who's a whisper from the edge of reason. Brother Able wades into battle for those innocents in her life. If he wins, it won't be only Libby's family he saves.
What is wrong with trying to cure cancer? Brother Able, hospice chaplain, asks himself that question every day. His boss, Dr. Rich Bernard, performs closet genetic experiments at Paradise House. He blackmails Able into keeping his secret. When a grieving husband asks Able to pray for his dying wife, Able finally breaks his silence.
Libby Davis might be prepared to accept death, to sacrifice herself for Rich's greater cause but fails to comprehend the love of a husband who cannot let her go and the son who's a whisper from the edge of reason. Brother Able wades into battle for those innocents in her life. If he wins, it won't be only Libby's family he saves.
- GenresFiction
342 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2016
92 people want to read
About the author
Lisa J. Lickel
32 books174 followersLisa Lickel is a writer and editor who lives with her husband in the rolling hills of western Wisconsin. A complete list of her novels: mysteries, award-winning romance and children’s books, and contemporary fiction can be found on her website. She writes newspaper features, short stories, magazine articles and radio theater. An avid book reviewer and blogger, freelance editor, and writing mentor, she loves to encourage new authors. She has two grown and married sons. Find more at LisaLickel.com.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
September 29, 2016
Medical ethics lie at the heart of this journey into the dark world of genetic experimentation. A hospice physician conducts test treatments for cancer and blackmails his chaplain into silence. Brother Able agrees through guilt until he encounters a grieving man who asks for prayers for his dying wife. Able must decide whether his own secrets are more important than watching a family dissolve under the pressure of untried experimentation.
This novel, set at the cutting edge of medical technology, centers around a heroine who’s battling cancer for the second time and her own demons. Unable to cope with the family dynamics involved in sharing her fears and hopes with those closest to her, she leaves home searching for a cure. Her journey takes many twists and turns as she finds herself in the care of a doctor willing to sacrifice anyone in an experiment for the greater good. She even meets someone who has a connection to her housekeeper, the woman who tried to make everything perfect for her family while she suffered.
Ms. Lickel keeps readers on the edge of their seats as they don’t know what to expect next. She holds their fascination as she explores the many emotions each character in the novel must deal with and the secrets they live with. I highly recommend this book about the sorrow of cancer and the affect it can have on a patient and those who love her as well as those experimenting with genetic engineering searching for a cure.
October 13, 2016
Fantastic and complex novel all about love and the possibility of death. The story relates the emotions and will of a family confronting cancer and the doctor and assistants helping Libby realize her goal.
January 10, 2017
Lisa Lickel has done it again. She’s crafted another novel with a unique concept and characters as interesting and troubling as the concept itself. Innocents Pray asks the question, if four people are praying for different answers to the same situation, how will God answer all of them?
Lisa’s story is disturbing on several levels – from the woman who goes away to die without telling her family what she’s doing, to the doctor creating his own version of medical ethics, to the son who is described on the back cover as “a whisper from the edge of reason”, to the conflicted hospice chaplain with a connection to each. Each individual is struggling with a huge internal conflict and question for which there is no pat answer, and wondering how the story can possibly end is what keeps us turning the pages. The characters themselves are often not very likeable, yet so real in the ways they are troubled that we care for them in their brokenness.
Lisa tends to write from a variety of interesting points of view, which creates a much more fascinating web than if this story had only been written from the viewpoints of, say, the MC who has cancer or Able, the hospice chaplain whose integrity is at odds with what he is being asked to do. She deftly goes between their points of view in first person, third person, and from a mysterious interchange on a weblog that keeps us guessing as to who is hosting and playing devil’s advocate on the site.
I would view Innocents Pray as a both literary and experimental women’s fiction, and Lisa is up to the task of presenting it to her readers. If there is anything critical, it would be that there was a time or two I felt slightly uncertain if I was understanding a particular relationship (near the end) clearly (that might have been me).
Intriguing on an eerily realistic level!
Lisa’s story is disturbing on several levels – from the woman who goes away to die without telling her family what she’s doing, to the doctor creating his own version of medical ethics, to the son who is described on the back cover as “a whisper from the edge of reason”, to the conflicted hospice chaplain with a connection to each. Each individual is struggling with a huge internal conflict and question for which there is no pat answer, and wondering how the story can possibly end is what keeps us turning the pages. The characters themselves are often not very likeable, yet so real in the ways they are troubled that we care for them in their brokenness.
Lisa tends to write from a variety of interesting points of view, which creates a much more fascinating web than if this story had only been written from the viewpoints of, say, the MC who has cancer or Able, the hospice chaplain whose integrity is at odds with what he is being asked to do. She deftly goes between their points of view in first person, third person, and from a mysterious interchange on a weblog that keeps us guessing as to who is hosting and playing devil’s advocate on the site.
I would view Innocents Pray as a both literary and experimental women’s fiction, and Lisa is up to the task of presenting it to her readers. If there is anything critical, it would be that there was a time or two I felt slightly uncertain if I was understanding a particular relationship (near the end) clearly (that might have been me).
Intriguing on an eerily realistic level!
September 6, 2016
Lisa Lickel’s Innocent’s Pray directly takes on controversial topics by getting to the heart of the matter. With deep, well-developed characters, she explores the emotional consequences of death, suffering, and sacrifice. Lickel makes bold choices in telling her story and they fit well to create tension and keep you reading. At times, the story is written in third person and other times it is told first person in the journal of a woman dying from cancer. Lickel further engages the reader by telling the story in her son’s confirmation journal. In these passages, Lickel takes on the doubts most Christians have throughout their spiritual life. Lickel adds a further twist by progresses her story through an online message board. The character participating in the forum is a mystery and we, as readers, must piece his identity together.
The novel has three great story lines that intertwine realistically. Each one kept me turning the pages to see what happens. Each character is like-able and yet handles things poorly at times. In other words, Lickel represents real life well. As the title implies, it is an inspirational story (read religious). Something I have not read to a great extent. However, I found this story to be a great story about people of faith. They rely on faith and prayer. However, many mainstream works forget that real people do have faith. The events of the story unfold as a story. Not as a parable.
Well, perhaps it can be a parable as Lickel takes on controversial topics. However, it is a well-written one and it is up for the reader to decide the message. This book is described as book one in the Paradise House Series and I look forward to reading the next.
The novel has three great story lines that intertwine realistically. Each one kept me turning the pages to see what happens. Each character is like-able and yet handles things poorly at times. In other words, Lickel represents real life well. As the title implies, it is an inspirational story (read religious). Something I have not read to a great extent. However, I found this story to be a great story about people of faith. They rely on faith and prayer. However, many mainstream works forget that real people do have faith. The events of the story unfold as a story. Not as a parable.
Well, perhaps it can be a parable as Lickel takes on controversial topics. However, it is a well-written one and it is up for the reader to decide the message. This book is described as book one in the Paradise House Series and I look forward to reading the next.
September 11, 2016
Innocents Pray wrestles with the issue of facing terminal illness in a very thought-provoking way. As the main character struggles with a deadly relapse of cancer and decides she would rather disappear than force her family to suffer with her, I began to wonder if I would be tempted to do the same thing. Each character's actions, or avoidance of actions, contribute to a complex situation where the lines get blurred between right and wrong, good and evil. In the midst of this pain and confusion, prayer offers the characters a lifeline. This is a book I'll still be mulling over long after I finished it.
September 5, 2016
What a thought provoking book. Dealing with a recurrence of cancer to the love ones of the patient. How will God answer their different prayers for the same thing? I was greatly moved by the conflicting emotions of all the characters and the conflicts in their relationships. I felt as though I had the opportunity, not only to observe, but to get to know each of them as this story moved along. The story moves from the viewpoint of, basically, three individuals. Super well done. I highly recommend this book. I received a copy in exchange for an honest review.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews