“Sisterchicks in Wooden Shoes” by Robin Jones Gunn

Robin Jones Gunn’s “Sisterchicks in Wooden Shoes” is an unusually life-like book for women. Amidst all of the drama and silly circumstances, the plot events are highly plausible. Number eight in the Sisterchicks series, readers do not have to read the previous books to follow the story. In fact, not all of the Sisterchicks novels use the same characters; each book tends to have a different story of women coming together in God. This disappoints readers who, after discovering that Noelle and Summer are finally meeting for the first time, realize there are no letters to read from when they conversed as pen pals in an earlier book.

Anyway, the story is enjoyable. Summer receives a call from a doctor telling her that she may have breast cancer. With a week before she needs to go in for a biopsy, she puts life on hold to finally see her pen pall of forty years in the Netherlands. Living in denial, Summer lives it up in the hospitality of her friend. It is only towards the end of the book that Summer opens up to Noelle about why she truly came. Noelle also opens up to Summer about her long-lasting feud with her father. Moving to Europe when she was eighteen, she has yet to speak wit her father who violently resisted her leap of independence.

This book reflects on the blessings of God. The few Bible quotations that are present are recited by the main characters. Some are even paraphrased in rather facetious manners to relate better to what situations the girls are in. Overall, both women become closer to God and help each other trust in His divine nature. Funny and sad all at the same time, this book is as bittersweet as the Dutch chocolate lauded by Summer.