Reviewed by Tammy
TITLE: What No One Else Can Hear
AUTHOR: Brynn Stein
PUBLISHER: Dreamspinner Press
LENGTH: 234 pages
BLURB:
Young Stevie Liston is diagnosed with autism, but is really an overwhelmed empath who mentally called out for help. Jesse McKinnon heard him in a dream from clear across the country, and that dream sent him on a six-year search to find Stevie. Once they meet, they think everything will work out and Jesse will help Stevie cope.
Stevie does improve immensely, but a disgruntled co-worker of Jesse’s conspires with Stevie’s estranged but politically powerful father to keep Stevie and Jesse apart with trumped-up legal charges claiming Jesse sexually abused the boy. Jesse must watch helplessly as Stevie loses all the advances he’s made.
If it wasn’t for his growing relationship with his co-worker Drew Ferguson, Jesse knows he wouldn’t have the strength to fight for his rights and Stevie’s future. Drew just might be the real thing, but with the very real possibility of serving jail time for a crime he didn’t commit, Jesse’s hopes for a future with Drew might be doomed.
REVIEW:
Stevie Liston was born with intense empathy with autistic traits but everyone thinks he’s just severely autistic. Stevie’s mother made sure his world was safe and secure for him, she made sure there was nothing to upset him because Stevie’s empathy is such that he “feels” emotions, they feel like stinging ants biting him the more intense the emotion the more sting he feels. Loud noises are also a trigger for Stevie and he can’t control his own emotional reactions. Unfortunately, Stevie’s mother died in a car crash when he was four years old and his father decided that as a Senator, having an autistic child would be good for his image only in so far as he can trot Stevie out when needed, not for him to actually live with him. Stevie was put into a home for intellectually and physically handicapped children. So started Stevie’s relationship with Jesse McKinnon.
Jesse was in college when he first started “dreaming” about young Stevie. At first there was only the one dream then about six months later he had another one. They started happening quite regularly after that and that is when he realised that he wasn’t actually dreaming but being drawn into Stevie’s “mind world”. As Jesse gets to know Stevie, as much as he can know a 4year old, Jesse comes to realise that he has to find Stevie in the real world because Stevie is a lot more centred whenever he is around him.
Stevie has made himself a forest where he can go to get away from everyone’s emotions in the real world. Ever since Stevie’s father basically dumped him in the home he has withdrawn from the world. He hasn’t ever spoken a word from the moment he arrived there but everyone has fallen in love with him because of his sweet nature.
It takes Jesse 6 years to find Stevie and when he does it’s at a critical time as Stevie has been spending more time “asleep” than awake. The doctors at the home are ready to start radical treatment! The moment Jesse walks in the front door he sees his picture on the office wall, the further in he walks the more pictures of himself he sees. Jesse’s never been in the state let alone this particular children’s home so now he knows for sure he’s found Stevie.
Stevie is 10 years old when he meets his “Bear”, the name he has for Jesse because when they first met Jesse had long hair and was making an attempt to grow a beard. It takes a while for Jesse to realise it’s not going to be an instant fix with Stevie. It’s going to take a lot of time, love and effort to bring Stevie to a functioning level. It’s not all roses, there are a few noses put out when Stevie makes such a marked improvement within days of Jesse starting. Stevie makes such an improvement that everyone is completely astounded when one of his co-workers makes a charge of child abuse to Stevie’s father and well, the Senator can’t help but get on the bandwagon. After all, it’s all good press!
While Jesse is trying to cope with being labelled a child abuser as well as keeping Stevie on track whilst not being allowed near him, Jesse and his co-worker Drew start seeing each other. At the beginning it starts out as a way of keeping the lines of direct communication open with Stevie but the more time they spend together the more they fall in love with each other. Drew backs Jesse all the way, he knows there is nothing to the allegations but sour grapes and jealousy. When it comes out that not only did Stevie’s father dump him at the home he has refused to have anything to do with Stevie’s welfare in the six years he has been at the home. Jesse and his lawyers finally have the leverage they need to get him to back off and drop the charges because they have been proven false time and again.
What No One Else Can Hear is an incredibly intense book about intellectual disability and the effect they have on not just the person but everyone around them. This book has a lot of emotional ups and downs, there are dark moments of course but they are far out-weighed by the upbeat, successful, YES! moments. There is a love story between Jesse and Drew but the real love story is between Stevie and Jesse. They have a very deep, very real “father/son” love that neither have ever had with their own fathers’. This is a definite must read book for all.
RATING:
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