Book Review: Sara's Laughter by Tom Milton

 Sara's Laughter by Tom Milton is a novel about Sara, a Catholic wife in her thirties living in Yonkers in 1993. She and her husband are struggling with infertility caused by her endometriosis. She's trying to take care of elderly, widowed father and is the victim of her younger sister's unrelenting envy.

(yep, I cropped this from my Yarn Along pic)

The novel is quite literary and has depth. From the title and the fact I got it from a cooperative of small Christian publishers I thought it would be an allegory of the life of Sarah, Abraham's wife. While Milton does draw comparisons between his character and her namesake, including having her teach the Bible story to children, it goes beyond that.  In many ways Milton develops not only the characters of Sara, her husband, father, sister and priest, but also introduces the characters of Yonkers and the Catholic Church.

One thing I found interesting that was when seeking guidance and meaning for her events and struggles in the book the Church's methods and practices were presented. But at the key moment for Sara's character she finds the answer is Jesus himself, not through the Catholic Church as a mediator.

I can't say much more without ruining the book for you, but I did want to say that I wished for more in the ending. It was a fitting ending, it just seemed abrupt and not entirely resolved, as I personally could think of many ways in which the implied ending might not turn out as implied.

Overall, I recommend and enjoyed this novel. But it was not what I expected.

I received this book from the BookCrash program free in exchange for my unbiased review.

PS.I thought it was really cool that Tom Milton autographed my copy.