Bat-Ami remarks in a letter: "Difficult occurrences can move a character into the mystical [plane] easily, and so Rebecca's father's illness does that for her." Rebecca has grown into the world of questions, confusions, and challenges that mark the passage from childhood to young adulthood. The family crisis of her father's need for a heart operation triggers her effort to settle many of the problems and questions before her by communing with God. Having found praying to God difficult, she writes to the lessspiritually-remote Elijah to try to work her way through tormenting personal issues such as her relationship to God, her relationship with her father and family, and her sense of low self-worth.

Dear Elijah is Rebecca's account of how she grows as she deals with her personal and family crisis. Much of her growth is dependent on her religious faith. She believes...