Worlds Collide, by Alison Strobel

Salvation, Hollywood-style.

I've been doing a lot of reading lately, and I find three categories of books. Some books sit on my bookshelf that I mean to read but never get past the first few pages. Other books sit on my bedside table that I read a chapter or two, put down for a few days, and pick back up a few days later. Then there are books that I pick up, carry around with me, and read every free moment until it is finished. Worlds Collide by Alison Strobel was this last kind of book for me.

Grace Winslowe is a midwestern girl in a dead end job and an equally doomed live-in relationship. She packs up and moves to California for a new, sunshiney life, and discovers through friends the soul-satisfying and joy-filled life that accompanies a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. I can relate to this girl since I pretty much lived that same life myself for more years than I choose to remember. She meets Jack Harrington, a famous Hollywood actor who lives what seems like the stereotypical celebrity life of relationship hopping and the trappings of fame and fortune. The rest of the story chronicles their relationship and spiritual journey together.

There is a fair amount of “missionary dating” in this book where the characters become involved with each other without the spiritual commonality of Christianity, only to both find their way to a shared faith. I thought the outcomes of these relationships were a little bit hopeful and too good to be true, but they certainly made a satisfying fictional story. I rooted for the characters to come together, as I tend to do, and voila, they did. I'm not so certain these kinds of relationships really turn out that way in real life – call me a cynic (oh gosh, I'm really not but anyway).

I loved reading Alison Strobel after having read a little bit of Lee Strobel's A Case for Faith. I could hear what I imagine to be the influence of his teachings on her story, and it made for a more realistic picture of the questions lifetime non-believers like Grace, Jack, and their biography writer Jada would have about Christianity. I appreciated how Strobel approached the metamorphosis of the non-believer into a follower of Jesus Christ.

There were several times I thought to myself that this would be a great book to recommend to a non-believer seeking the truth about Christianity, and I just might. I really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading more from Strobel in the future. I wonder if I will be able to relate so well to the characters in her other works.

I received this e-book from Waterbrook Multnomah's Blogging for Books for free for my honest review of this e-book.