Dear Dana by Amy Weinland Daughters is somewhat of a story within a story. A tale for our lives now that started when the author realized that someone she knew as a teen, and who she was friends with on Facebook, was suffering a personal tragedy. The realization that she could only claim superficial knowledge of the people she called friends, launched Daughters on a journey that would have wide ramifications for her life.

The subtitle of the book, “that time i went crazy and wrote all 580 of my Facebook friends a handwritten letter,” is intriguing enough, but it doesn’t tell all of the story. Daughters was inspired to begin her quest of personal letter writing after she had written many letters of support and offered continuous prayers for her friend from summer camp, Dana, and Dana’s family.

The book chronicles how Daughters felt called to reach out to Dana even though the two hadn’t been in personal contact in years. It also details the parameters of her writing project. Letters would be handwritten, two pages long, and she would do her best to find addresses without asking for them outright. Names would be chosen at random from slips of paper drawn from a box.

Reading Dear Dana is a bit like listening to a friend talk about a major undertaking in her life. Daughters is down to earth, and she’s honest about the times she didn’t get things right. But overall Dear Dana is a testament to the power of prayer and the ability we each have to make a difference in someone’s life as well as be intentional about the people we call friends.

The publisher provided me with a copy of this title in exchange for my honest review.