Letters for Lizzie, by Jim O’Donnell, is a story of love, friendship and a battle for life.
Walking with Arthur is a tribute to the power of friendship. Both books are published by Northfield/Moody Publishing, Chicago.
Jim O’Donnell is available for interviews. Contact the author by calling Janis Backing, Northfield/Moody Publishing, at 312-329-2108. E-mail Janis. Or, write her at 820 N. LaSalle Blvd., Chicago, IL 60610.
Some questions frequently asked of Jim about Letters for Lizzie:
Why did you write this book?
(Because I was suffering from the predictable stresses of caring for a seriously ill wife. My life was falling apart. Writing was a therapy for me and a way to connect to others whose friendship and prayers I dearly sought.)
Who could benefit from a book about people suffering?
(People who are undergoing serious challenges in their lives, to what’s important to them, to their core values.)
How is this book different from other tales of family struggle and suffering?
(While written by a person of faith, it is raw, immediate. It raises hard questions that some people try to answer too easily.)
As her caregiver, how has Lizzie’s illnesses changed you or your faith in God?
(I went into Lizzie’s illnesses thinking such things could never happen to “good” people like us. But such devastation does occur to any of us in an imperfect world. Faith is a great help, but it does not give us a passport out of life’s suffering.)
How did you handle any doubts that God loved you and Lizzie?
(At first, I didn’t have doubts. I just believed and trusted. But as the bad grew worse, I ranted and raved at the very God I also prayed to. It took time for grace and growth in my faith to mature.)
You intimate that the Christian community was largely helpful but, sometimes, somewhat unhelpful along your painful journey. Can you explain what you mean by this?
(The dear Christian community that surrounded, loved us and cushioned our fall for so long, in time, seemed to weary from their prayers not being answered. They seemed to suffer a kind of compassion fatigue.)
What was the hardest moment you have experienced over the years of Lizzie’s suffering?
(Learning after we’d bravely battled terminal cancer for nine months that a new battle against end-stage heart failure was just beginning.)
What joys have you found along the way?
(The simple joy of having more time with a women I love, of going for a walk around the block, of watching her see a son graduate from high school, another get married, another take his first job.)
Since the book actually began as a series of letters to “friends back east,” what was their reaction to what you and Lizzie were going through?
(Their reactions varied from “Good for you!” to “What a pair of nuts to have moved to another planet and then ask us to pray for them.” Experiences such as we have undergone rearrange friendships.)
Lizzie’s severe health problems gave rise to your writing Letters for Lizzie. How can this book be helpful to people facing other types of suffering?
(Suffering whether from illness, job loss, betrayal, or changed finances tends to leave one isolated, feeling abandoned, alone. Letters for Lizzie is a stab at the heart of those feelings. It is meant to give hope to any who have to travel though the valley of the shadow of death – and most of us will one day, sooner or later.)
What others are saying about Letters for Lizzie
Some questions frequently asked of Jim about Walking with Arthur:
Why did you write this book?
Why would anybody want to read a book about someone’s friendship with a neighbor?
What is the role of friendship in developing maturity?
How did your friend Arthur change you, or influence the change that came to you?
How did friendship with Arthur challenge you differently than other friendships you may have had in your life before meeting him?
What would you hope a reader would do as a result of reading Walking with Arthur?
What were the best and the worst moments you knew as a friend of Arthur’s?
Do you think many people today have a friend like Arthur?
If you don’t think that many have a friendship as you had with Arthur, why do you think that?
Most people say they would like more or better friends, but you don’t think they’re being honest. What do you mean?
What others are saying about Walking with Arthur
Library Reviews, summer ‘05 (pdf)
Challies.com is a Canadian on-line magazine. This a review of Walking with Arthur, dated August 5, 2005. http://www.challies.com/archives/001200.php
Regent Univ., Virginia Beach, VA, reviewed Walking with Arthur in the Spring of 2005 http://www.regent.edu/acad/schbus/maz/busreview/issue18/arthur.html
The New York Times (pdf), 4/10/2005
Touchstone Magazine Review (pdf), May 2005
Fort Wayne Journal Gazette (pdf), 2/26/05
Huntington Herald-Press (pdf), 2/16/05
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