The Age of Innocence

This brilliant new novel traces the lives of teenagers.

Too often we forget about our youth in our communities who are going through life's journey. The Age of Innocence is written through the eyes of two high school teenagers, England and Gabby. They are the main characters and their lives are filled with responsibilities and difficult challenges. From a teenager's point-of-view making tough decisions can be difficult, and the challenges can be so intense. Some teenagers go into deep depression when their life is not what they think it should be. Gabby and England's parents guided them and mentored them along the way. These girls have high self-esteem, they are very active in their church, they are athletes, and most of all they have a relationship with God. However, they still had to cope with situations and people that await them on their journey.

The Age of Innocence looks at the behavior of teens; sees their thoughts, fears, and mistakes in relationship building. As pre-teens move forward into their upper teen years, their hormones start to kick in and they start to look at their sexuality. Some teens become confused at this stage and start thinking about developing serious sexual relationships without having all the facts. This is the age where teens are starting to pay attention to the opposite sex and now they believe it is time for dating. For some teens, dating is about experimenting and with experimentation comes emotional highs and lows. Teens need to be guided through their teen life. Otherwise, they will make a lot of mistakes that could have been avoided. At this age, building relationships are important to teenagers. This is the beginning of learning how to skillfully develop relationships. Although teens think they know it all, they still lack judgment, experience, and wisdom.

England and Gabby have friends, but not many. These friends come from all walks of life. Through their journey they help shed some light on the HIV and STD epidemic among adults as well as teenagers. For some of their friends, this information may have been a little too late. We never thought there would be so many children, adolescents, and teenagers affected by these diseases. They are at the age of innocence. They are at the age where they are supposed to be enjoying school, their friends, learning how to play several sports, or instruments. They are not supposed to be living with a disease that is not curable, but they are. Some contracted the diseases from their parents, others contracted it through risky behaviors. Whatever the case may be, sex education should be a focusing point for all of us.