Stealing Angel
Terry Wolverton
Spinsters Ink (2011)
ISBN 9781935226451
Reviewed by Paige Lovitt for Reader Views (7/11)
After Maggie Seaver’s lover Yoli leaves her, she continues to be a mother figure to Angel, a child that was conceived while Yoli was cheating on Maggie. Knowing that Angel is a blessing in her life, Maggie loves her as if she had given birth to her. Angel, now seven, calls Maggie “Maggiemama.”
As Yoli pursues a career in music, she also hooks up with a lot of unsavory characters whom she hopes can help to further her career. This does not sit well with Maggie because she worries about these people hurting Angel. After Yoli removes Angel from Maggie’s care, at the directive of her latest boyfriend, Maggie gets a call from Angel’s teacher. Rather than contact authorities and have Angel become a potential victim of the system, the teacher calls Maggie to let her know that Angel is being hurt. When Maggie arrives at Angel’s school and sees her bruises, she rashly decides to take off with her.
She hopes to get Angel out of the United States and down to The Light Beings, a religious commune in Baja California, without being caught. As they venture down into Mexico, Maggie does everything she can to protect both of them. Relying on others from her religious group Maggie gets some help along the way. Venturing down into Baja California, below where the American tourists usually go, Maggie is seeking Guru Tam, whom she hopes can help guide her to make the right choices for Angel.
When Maggie arrives in the place where she believes that the commune is located nearby, she discovers that American way of life has been extended down to this part of Mexico and that with satellite television people will know that she is being sought, and might be willing to turn her in for the reward. When Maggie finds her way to the Light Beings, she learns that Guru Tam is very ill, and she also sees that the people living there are not as friendly as the ones that she left behind in Los Angeles. Having to rely purely on her faith as the situation escalates, Maggie discovers more of the truth about these people and how much they can really help her. She also learns who her true friends really are.
“Stealing Angel” tells an incredible story of a woman who learns to seek the answers from the truth that she holds within herself first, before she seeks it from others. Maggie’s inner dialogue contains a great deal of wisdom from which all readers will benefit and find a great deal of material for journaling. I loved reading this story because it tells the tale of a woman on a journey that will teach her to trust the voices within herself and to discover her sacred gifts. This is definitely a “must read” book.
