Book Review: Four Before Their Time By Timothy Spillane

FOUR BEFORE THEIR TIME
A Story of Hope, Resilence, and Miracles

By: Timothy Spillane

Published: August 22, 2014

Publisher: SkitterBird, LLC

Non-Fiction/Memoir/Christian

Anne is an Army officer, physician, and wife. Anne and her husband Rob decide it is time to have a family and get one all in one swoop. Anne becomes pregnant with quadruplets. As the title indicates, Anne delivers the babies much sooner than they had hoped due to conditions that put her life and the babies in danger.  Anne’s father, Timothy Spillane, shares the intense roller coaster ride that Anne and Rob, the babies, and their extended family and friends go through as the babies fight to stay alive. Timothy writes as a parent trying to support his exhausted and emotionally drained daughter as well as from the perspective of a grandparent, praying for the lives of his four precious grandchildren. The entire family relies on faith, hope, and resilience to get through the hours and days of these precious babies’ lives. They dare to believe in not just one, but four miracles.

A baby who is born four months premature has a tough road ahead let alone quadruplets born four months early. This journey for Anne, her husband Rob and their family was daunting. I was in awe as I read through the daily, even hourly decisions that they had to make regarding their babies’ health. I was overwhelmed with their exhaustion, their dedication to being with their babies, and the life-changing decisions that seem to dominate their days.  Without the support of each other and a strong faith that God would see them through, I am not sure any of them would have survived.

Each one of the quadruplets have mounting medical issues, many times one condition making another condition more difficult. Nearly every day, the news Anne and Rob had to handle was more than one person could take in a year, let alone multiple times in one day. But, even when there seemed to be no more room for hope in their lives, they never lost hope in a miracle or four miracles. What this young family overcomes is nothing short of amazing and is most definitely a miracle.

This book will encourage any reader to believe in miracles, to have faith and hope in good things, and to find the desire to power through any struggles. In the Epilogue, the reader will again be shocked by what this family must go through in 2013. This memoir shares their remarkable sacrifices and proves they can survive anything with their love for each other and faith in God’s plan.  Keep a tissue box close by while reading.

This book trailer gives away the fact that the babies make it home, but it doesn’t change your reading of the book. If anything, it will make you more in awe of the unbelievable challenges these four babies overcome to eventually come home.