LIFE LINES:
Two Friends Sharing Laughter, Challenges and Cupcakes
By Deborah Duncan and Cathy Le Feuvre
Authentic. 230 pages. £7.99
ISBN 978 1 860 249 303
This book is a conversation in cyberspace between two Christian women, in their 40s, one single, the other married, sharing details of their lives and friends with each other. It is easy to read, chatty, humorous, and sarcastic in places.
I’m not a fan of getting truth across in fiction, which probably says something about my age and I didn’t become a great fan of the book as I read more. At least the authors aren’t pious and sanctimonious – far from it! I wondered if I was getting a typical view of middle-class British female Christians: man-obsessed, cynical of church, catty?
Not much off limits
There’s a lot of proof-texting and the biblical content is sparse, there is a lot of content about good works and charities. Few subjects are off-limits, but those conversations are tastefully done. You have to read a lot of text before you can pick out some gems of wisdom.
Would I give the book to someone I know? Probably not, unless they were a colleague. Together we would use it to study this version of contemporary female spirituality and work out how we address these issues and cross the cultural divide. And in case you re interested, it’s not a complemen-tarian book.
