Eight Days in Darkness by Anita Woolridge and Angela Roegner

Eight Days in Darkness: The True Story of the Abduction, Rape and Rescue of Anita Woolridge. Synergy Books. April 2010. ISBN #: 9780984076031

Brace yourself for a very difficult but very necessary story that is unfortunately all too true! The writing is expressed for two purposes: first, to complete another phase of the healing process for this brave, feisty, believing woman and second, to reach out to readers for the sake of safety and the always possibilities of healing and blessing!

Anita Wooldridge was abducted from her home on June 25, 1998 in daylight hours with no anticipation of the horrors she was about to endure. One gets the clear perception that she didn't spend too much time going over the newly horrific sexual assaults of various types or brutal beatings she endured at the hands of this pathologically sick man. Instead, Anita wisely realizes that talk is the only way she will survive this ordeal, saying to Tom Steele, or the mole as she refers to him in her account, exactly what he needed to hear. Only in this way did she avoid even more brutality that she could see was so often lying just below his surface appearance and waiting to lash out without warning.

We get some idea of his background, learning of where his rage originated and how it grew to profound mental illness with each new rejection, mockery and humiliation. This certainly in no way excuses one iota of what deviant acts he perpetrated on this innocent young woman, but it should alert all readers to awareness of what acts trigger dangerous possibilities and the need for alertness in all places, for one's own safety and perhaps even the safety of another not so alert and therefore susceptible to such predators.

Faith is the largest reality that allowed Anita to endure. It's not saccharine, meaningless stuff but the gritty test of faith in the most difficult, hopeless situation one could possibly imagine!

The reality of this nightmare week and a day come even more to focus after her rescue by the Howard County Sheriff's Office and the Kokomo Police Department, as well as FBI agents, as one realizes the psychological scars that began to emerge in treatment and through her therapeutic journaling.

This is a tribute to the faith and courage of a very brave woman who suffered so much but totally leaned on her faith that God would help her endure it all right up to freedom and healing.

Amazing!