Trials of Patience
Every holiday, every summer visit to her grandparents' farmhouse in tiny Amboy, Indiana, Patience Kelly climbed those attic stairs - because her grandfather told her to, and because he promised to kill everyone she loved if she didn't.
For years, Patience buried what happened so deep that even she couldn't find it. She grew up a good Christian girl in small-town Indiana, sang hymns in the car with her family, said her prayers every night. But something inside her was broken in ways she couldn't name, and no amount of Bible verses could fix it.
When Patience arrives at Taylor University, she thinks she's finally free. Then she meets Marcus - charming, confident, controlling - and history repeats itself in ways she never saw coming. A date rape, a pregnancy, an impossible choice, and a pastor who asks all the wrong questions send her spiraling toward a darkness that nearly swallows her whole.
What follows is a story of addiction and recovery, of hospitalization and healing, of memories so painful her own mind hid them from her for years. It's about the damage that purity culture inflicts on survivors, the courage it takes to speak the unspeakable, and the people - a fierce best friend, a patient therapist, a gentle woodworker named Elijah - who refuse to let her disappear.
Trials of Patience is unflinching, heartbreaking, and ultimately hopeful. It's a novel about a woman who was broken before she was old enough to understand what breaking meant - and who rebuilds herself anyway, one painful, beautiful piece at a time.
Because survival isn't the end of the story. It's just the beginning.
Contains depictions of childhood sexual abuse, sexual assault, mental health crisis, addiction, and suicidal ideation. If you or someone you know needs support, please call or text the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988.
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