Book Review - Shadows at Dusk

The latest installment in Elizabeth Goddard’s Missing in Alaska series is a frantic flight to find a missing sister and stop a murderer before he kills Carrie James (again.) The bush pilot finds herself thrown into Detective Trevor West’s search for his missing sister, even though he is the last thing she needs. Island hopping in southeast Alaska involves spending too much time with this man who makes her feel things she refuses to ever feel again, and it is hard to avoid opening up to someone when you continually find yourself in vulnerable positions with them. Goddard keeps the reader hopping as well, following the whodunnit of multiple transgressions while dodging danger by the most narrow margins. Also appearing in this sequel are several of our friends from the first installment, Cold Light of Day, who help search for the truth amidst the information Carrie and Trevor give and other evidence that turns up. Shadows at Dusk is sure to keep you enthralled from dusk til dawn.

Shadows at Dusk, Missing in Alaska series book 2, by Elizabeth Goddard is available now from your favorite local bookseller or online:

Baker Book House            Christian Book                Walmart                Amazon

Thank you to the author and publisher for allowing me a copy to read and review. All opinions expressed here are my own and are completely genuine.

Book Review - Into The Fire

Irene Hannon’s latest release has all the good stuff of a well written romantic suspense novel. There’s the intelligent and determined arson investigator who is trying to solve a puzzle before anyone else dies while fighting her own demons from the past. And there is, of course, the sensitive but keen ATF Special Agent who is assigned to work with her and must then work out what to do with the feelings he develops for her. There are some wonderfully supportive family members and then there is the foe. The one who killed arson investigator Bri Tucker’s former colleague, leaving her to solve a puzzle she can’t even seem to decipher. And the one who is causing a series of really crummy events to keep Bri off balance when she needs to be able to focus. Of course, Special Agent Marc Davis is messing with her balance a bit in a different sort of way. If only they could wrap up their joint investigation so they can focus on the heat building between them. Hannon’s storyline lights up intrigue you will struggle to contain in Into the Fire.

Into the Fire, the first book in Irene Hannon’s Undaunted Courage series, is available now from you favorite local bookseller or online:

Baker Book House            Christian Book            Walmart            Amazon

Thank you to the author and publisher for allowing me a copy to read and review. All opinions expressed here are my own and are completely genuine.

Book Review - Against The Wind

Amanda Cabot’s latest release is the second in her Secrets of Sweetwater Crossing series, Against The Wind, and she blows in small town intrigue like a dust storm. Louisa Vaughn has a heart for healing and wants to do that for the community where she grew up. However, in late 1800s Texas, a female doctor is a radical idea that gets people riled up. Sweetwater Crossing is no exception and the resistance varies from loud mumbling to gravely dangerous acts that put others in harm’s way to prove a point. But Louisa has the unwavering support of her sister and of her first solo patient, Josh Porter. Josh has problems of his own, though. Outsiders may be welcomed here, but certainly with a fair amount of caution. And the broken leg Louisa has set for him throws a kink in his plans to get home to New York in time to try to win control of the family legacy in the competition his grandfather set forth.

If you don’t already know Sweetwater Crossing like your own hometown from After The Shadows, the town and its residents will quickly become familiar, thanks to Cox’s careful addition of the locals and their various places. You are effortlessly transported to the lush Texas Hill Country, to a slower and more organic time and place, with the sun on your face and the wind in your hair. Against The Wind will easily pull you in and leave you longing for the next installment of the Secrets of Sweetwater Crossing.

After The Shadows, book two in the Secrets of Sweetwater Crossing series by Amanda Cabot is available now from your favorite local bookseller or online:

Baker Book House            Christian Book            Barnes & Noble            Amazon

Thank you to the author and publisher for allowing me a copy to read and review. All opinions expressed here are my own and are completely genuine.

Book Review - A Royal Christmas

There is a certain antihistamine brand that advertises with the song which proclaims it is the most wonderful time of the year. My husband can attest that this advertisement, regardless of my feelings about the product, chafes my soul like a swimsuit 2 sizes too small. They tease! I’m a fall fan through and through, but that phrase is reserved specifically for Christmas and to use it elsewhere is to deliver false hope. However, there is a silver tinsel light at the end of the tunnel, because fall means the release of the new Melody Carlson Christmas novella. It is the harbinger of Christmas carols to come, the first hopeful glimmer of the season in which I truly come alive! This year’s gift, A Royal Christmas, is a splendid addition to the Carlson Christmas chronicles I so crave. It is like jingling sleigh bells stop in front of my house on the sweltering fall day each year when my Carlson Christmas novella arrives. This one involves law student Adelaide Smith, still mourning the loss of her mother, and whose life is about to be shaken by the news that her father has found her by using a DNA match. And her father is the ailing king of a small Eastern European principality. And also, he hopes to stay alive long enough to meet the daughter he only recently learned he has, hopefully to find in her the heir to rule Montovia.

The relationships woven together through this story are intricate. It’s not your super cozy Christmas novella where someone misinterprets a hug between siblings as competition for romance. Adelaide quickly, but realistically, builds bonds with various members of the royal family and staff members. Some are worth keeping and others are a bit more in the spirit of Krampus than Father Christmas, when nefarious motives come into play. Carlson moves the book forward with a full novel’s character development and storyline in a novella length word count; a skill that left me feeling utterly satisfied and a wee bit bonded with certain characters. And if you know someone who delights in a Christmas novella, allow me to suggest this as a fantastic gift. I will surely reread A Royal Christmas at the height of my Thanksgiving through the new year Christmas novella marathon!

A Royal Christmas by Melody Carlson is available now from your favorite local bookseller or online:

Baker Book House        Christian Book            Barnes & Noble            Amazon

Thank you to the author and publisher for allowing me a copy to read and review. All opinions expressed here are my own and are completely genuine.

Book Review - He Should Have Told The Bees

Love and identity are timeless themes, expressed in every story in some way or another, it seems. Amanda Cox breaks these down in a tale of two women in He Should Have Told The Bees. Beckett Walsh’s father made a comfortable world for his beloved daughter on the farm they shared alone after her mother left them. She was his apprentice and was happy to carry on in his shadow until his death ripped away the security she relied on even more than she had known. Callie Peterson had no such stability in a world without a father and with a mother whose addictions stole any illusion of security. She should have been through living with the weight of her mother’s continued rejection and chaos, but the boundaries she so carefully constructed are torn down again by her mother’s pleas for help. There is no reason why Beckett or Callie should know about the other’s existence, until George Walsh’s trust divides his estate in half between them. Where each woman has struggled for a lifetime to understand who they are and why they weren’t enough for their parents to stay, this pivotal point begins a new search for understanding neither ever expected.

He Should Have Told The Bees is both heart wrenching and soul stirring, as Cox explores issues we all wrestle with, and does it in a manner that has the reader invested from the first appearance of a spunky alien waif in the Walsh Farms apiary. I have to confess that I was listening to an audiobook in which a spunky alien waif pops up in the path of an unsuspecting young woman, so I had to put He Should Have Told The Bees down for a time in order to keep the storylines from getting jumbled together. I was a bit trepidatious, then, when I resumed this book and hoped it wouldn’t be just another iteration of a storyline I had so recently explored. I worried this one might not hold its own against such a similar cast of characters. There was absolutely no cause for concern. He Should Have Told The Bees is its own story, with its own characters, and there is no confusing the two once those relationships between reader and subjects have been forged. And frankly, Katya Amadeus Cimmaron of the Vesper Galaxy is the kind of lovable, spunky alien waif you just want to scoop up and feed cupcakes. With galaxy frosting. And star sprinkles.

Without a doubt, Amanda Cox’s latest release, He Should Have Told The Bees, is a bit of a tear jerker, a bit of an emotional struggle, and a triumph.

He Should Have Told The Bees by Amanda Cox is available now from your favorite local bookseller or online:

Baker Book House            Christian Book            Barnes & Noble        Amazon

Thank you to the author and publisher for allowing me a copy to read and review. All opinions expressed here are my own and are completely genuine. 

Book Review - Summer In The Spotlight

Levi Ross has decided to ignore the meteorologist who predicted a particularly early hurricane for Prince Edward Island and the consequences would be just what he deserved… if he deserved to be quietly tending the wounds of PEI’s only other resident stuck in the school when said hurricane dropped a tree through the roof of Kelsey Ahern’s classroom. But what he deserves has been a sticking point for Levi ever since his dad left the island and all his collateral damage without looking back. With Kelsey fired up about the future of the storm damaged Victoria Playhouse, and Levi fired up by Kelsey all over again, his past, present, and future are on a collision course. I can say from experience, Liz Johnson’s third installment of her Prince Edward Island Shores series apparently does not have to be read in order for the reader to get caught up in the storm that rages between the girl who grew up in the spotlight and the guy who will do anything to hide from it. The Ross family dynamics and their community of neighbors fuel this story all the way to a satisfying ending.

Summer In The Spotlight, Prince Edward Island Shores series book 3, by Liz Johnson is available September 1 from your favorite local bookseller or online:

Baker Book House          Christian Book           Barnes & Noble            Amazon 

Thank you to the author and publisher for allowing me a copy to read and review. All opinions expressed here are my own and are completely genuine. 

Book Review - Voice Of The Ancient

From the very beginning, with the four cousins hiding above and spying on the proceedings as the nation of Israel waits with bated breath for lots to be cast and a king to be called forth, Voice Of The Ancient moves furiously and eloquently through the bloody beginning of Saul’s reign. Zevi, Gavriel, Avidan, and Shalem are cousins on the cusp of manhood when the new king’s ragtag volunteer army is called up for battle and the pact of their blood brotherhood is put to the test. With two of them meant for the life of a soldier, the others must decide who they are and who they are meant to be in the eyes of the One Who Sees. And the One Who Sees has a plan beyond their rebellion. For Avi, that includes crossing paths with a young boy who is mistaken as his missing cousin and who is not actually a boy, but a woman in disguise for the sake of her treacherous journey to the safety of family she has never known. As Avidan and Keziah search for his missing cousin and her family, they learn together to listen to the Voice Of The Ancient for guidance.

Connilyn Cossette writes this coming of age story filled with turmoil and hope in a message about value and redemption from the One who gives both. I tried so hard to read it slowly and savor every detail, but was captivated from page one and finished it in a day. Connilyn has a great knack for truly immersing the reader in the lives of her characters. I am particularly fond of the longstanding relationships built throughout the course of her novels, which could be read enjoyably as standalone stories, but have a richness in the familiarity that has been developed through generations as I have read each of her novels.

Voice Of The Ancient, book 1 of The King’s Men series, by Connilyn Cossette is available now from you favorite local bookseller or online:

Baker Book House        Christian Book            Barnes & Noble            Amazon

Thank you to the author and publisher for allowing me a copy to read and review. All opinions expressed here are my own and are completely genuine.