Book Review: Mindful of Him by Hollis Hughes

About the Book:  Mindful of Him is a tale of heartbreak and triumph set in the 1950s. Separated from his young wife, and with both of his parents recently deceased, Rob McLain sets off on an adventure for which he has longed since childhood. Travel with Rob as his journey not only takes him to beautiful places, but also crosses his path with influential men who help him through his loneliness. Five months into the trip, Rob has a moonlight encounter that changes his life forever and overwhelmingly convinces this young skeptic that God is indeed mindful of him!

Through it all, he receives answers to life's deepest questions. What does he learn? What happens to his wife? Do they get back together? Does he make it back safely?

Find the answers to these questions and others dealing with faith, creation, nature, and more in Mindful of Him, which will keep you reading long after you had planned to turn out the lights. Mindful of Him was inspired by the writings of Dr. Francis A. Schaeffer, the giant of 20th Century Christian philosophers.

My thoughts: Honestly, I didn't really like this book.

It took me a little bit to get into it, but then I began to enjoy it a bit more.  Truthfully, parts of the book are simply captivating.  At first, I appreciated the philosophical thought process and the internal questions that Rob had, but after awhile it just seemed to be going around in circles ad nauseum.

In addition to this, there were several instances of vulgarity in the book which also gives me pause to recommend it, particularly since some of them came from the mouth of a pastoral character.  Both profanity and inappropriate comments about physical abuse were present, neither of which were essential to the storyline. It is possible to convey utter frustration in a different manner.  I have read some books where the use of profanity was understandable in the context, but I just felt this was inappropriate.

One of the most frustrating parts for me was the ending.  The novel had little enough storyline as it was, so the fact that it ended with one huge unanswered question was, frankly, annoying to me.

To be honest, if I hadn't agreed to read this book in it's entirety and review it, I'm not so sure I would've finished it, and that's happened less than 5 times in my life I'd say.

That being said, from some other reviews I've seen, some people thought this book was simply marvellous, so to each their own.  But I, personally, cannot recommend it.


Thank you to Litfuse Publicity for organizing this tour and providing me with my complimentary review copy.