Review: Acts of Lovingkindness
Acts of Lovingkindness
by Nina Kentsis
Porter Place Publishing, 2025
Category: Young Adult
Reviewer: Julie Ditton
Acts of Lovingkindness is a touching coming of age story that relates a teenager's experiences during her senior year in high school. It covers everything from first love, awakening sexuality, and the problems with the possibility of a long distance relationship once she goes to college. Although the character becomes involved in an adult relationship, the scenes are not explicit. The book would be appropriate for younger teens as well. But this is not really a love story, it also explores outgrowing friendships as people change, relatives with addiction, and broken trust. Nina Kentsis captures teenage angst and issues and the characters ring true.
Francie is Jewish, but is not particularly religious and has rarely attended services since her Bat Mitzvah. However, she needs community service hours for a high school credit and her mother has arranged for her to volunteer at the synagogue. She works with other volunteers at a nearby soup kitchen. Her advisor suggests she read the Book of Ruth. By examining this bible story, Francie learns about acts of lovingkindness. She realizes that we can all choose to be kind. And in making that choice she eventually resolves some of her problems. Although Francie is Jewish, her teenage experiences are universal and any adolescent can relate to the character. Choosing lovingkindness is a choice that anyone can make.
Francie is Jewish, but is not particularly religious and has rarely attended services since her Bat Mitzvah. However, she needs community service hours for a high school credit and her mother has arranged for her to volunteer at the synagogue. She works with other volunteers at a nearby soup kitchen. Her advisor suggests she read the Book of Ruth. By examining this bible story, Francie learns about acts of lovingkindness. She realizes that we can all choose to be kind. And in making that choice she eventually resolves some of her problems. Although Francie is Jewish, her teenage experiences are universal and any adolescent can relate to the character. Choosing lovingkindness is a choice that anyone can make.
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Reviewer Julie Ditton, The Storybook Lady, is an active reviewer on social media and on her new book blog storybooklady.net which has featured interviews of several Jewish children’s authors. She reviews a variety of genre, although, as her name would imply, her favorite genre is Children’s Literature. About half of the children’s books that she reviews have Jewish themes. She even has a dedicated shelf on Goodreads, Bubbe’s Bookshelf specifically for Jewish Children’s Books and is an active contributor to the Jewish Kidlit Mavens Facebook group.
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