Customer Reviews
A Little Girl's Imaginary Friend Is God - By: Hannah, 13 Jul 2008 
When Mariah White catches her husband cheating on her for the second time, the only thing that she has to live for is their 7 year-old daughter, Faith. But Faith's way of coping is to create an imaginary friend, one callled God, & when Faith starts performing miracles people begin taking notice of her. Soon the White family's life becomes a three ring circus, complete with a custody battle for Faith, religious figures & followers camping out in their garden, a TV reporter on a personal crusade determined to discredit Faith's abilities, & at the centre of it alll, a mother trying to connect with her daughter.
I admit because of the religious aspects of this book, I wasn't that interested in reading it, but my mother gave it to me as a birthday present & I proceeded to read it within three days. It was a terrific & addictive story which was more complexthan I thought. With many hidden tales & an intriguing court case the story had me gripped after the first few chapters. The custody battle comes the the forefront of the book in the second half & is very frustrating to read, but in a good way, when you want to interact with the characters.
As the main character Mariah initiallly comes off as cold & not very close to her daughter, but this changes as she tries to keep Faith out of harm's way. Faith, herself is a cute, precocious kid who just wants her mother's love & doesn't understand what she's doing by talking to God.
This is a good story that will keep you interested, so give it a chance.
Picoult at her best - no spoilers - By: Book worm, 30 Apr 2008 
To me "Keeping Faith" is one of her best books to date, & I have read a few. I think peoples opinions of this book vary so much because a lot of it is down to taste on the subject matter.
It seems to start where Maria White, who thinks her & her husband have a great relationship, finds out he's cheating & she's with Faith when he's caught out with another woman. After he leaves, Faith starts a friendship with an imaginary friend initiallly callled "guard". It's when she starts quoting passages from the bible, even though not from a religious or church going family, that her mother starts to worry. Her actions that follow, become known to the public & crowds gather outside her home. Some believers & some thinking Mariah is just trying to make some money from the little girl.
It makes you wonder whether this could reallly happen or not & Jodi Picoult leaves you wondering. Her handling of the subject matter is fantastic, & the way she makes the various relationships evolve in the book is very well handled.
I know some of the reviews on here are mixed, but certainly give it a go, & although you may not believe the subject matter it reallly does make for a good piece of fiction.
Strange and tedious - By: Ms. Samantha A. Pottinger, 31 Mar 2008 
I have enjoyed some of Picoult's other books, but struggled to finish this one. I found it to be extremely far fetched in some places, with the Jesus-like miracles Faith was supposed to be performing, such as bringing her dead Grandma back to life & healing alll the ill people in the hospital. Even though I'm not much of a cynic, I found myself thinking 'Oh, please' in several places, & this stopped me from enjoying it. A few of her other books have been very enjoyable because they deal with more believable life issues. This book, I just found strange & tedious.
WOW! - By: Kristina Morris, 07 Nov 2007 After faffing around in WHsmith for about an hour I picked this up & read a few pages.
When I got home I could NOT put this down! It reallly is a fantastic read, very clever-ly written & reallly dragges you in!
I am a very fussy reader, & if I don't seem to take any interest in the first few pages, then I won't read it, but this is truly fantastic.
I won't tell you what happened at the end, but it is about a mother who has suffered depression & her husband left cheated on her in her own home.
The daughter then started to see "God". The father wanted custody, but the mother was adament that she should keep her.
Absloubtly fantastic, I have already ordered the rest of Jodi Picoult's books from Amazon, as she honastly is a fantastic writer.
One of the best picoult Novels I've read so far... - By: Snapdragon, 07 Nov 2007 Mariah White believes that she is happily married until she discovers him with another woman. The trauma of the discovery & subsequent separation has an unexpected effect on their 7-year-old daughter Faith; she starts to talk to an imaginary friend. People believe that Faith has an active imagination, but then miraculous things start to happen around her & the Church & media begin to take an interest.
`Keeping Faith' follows a similar Picoult structure; first there is an incident, then we learn more about the characters, then there is a court case (in this case for custody of Faith.)
It would have been reallly easy for this novel to be overly sentimental & gushing but it reallly wasn't. There is balance & depth in the cast of characters & it's a real page turner.
Other than `Plain Truth' (which I loved) this is my favourite Picoult novel so far.
Recommended
