Winner is......

No big surprise...Beth! Yay! I will email you and get your mailing address. Thanks for commenting! :)

Time again for another Giveaway- Delia Parr's Hidden Affection

Ok everyone Giving away this Historical Christian Romance.
Here's how you enter:
1) Leave a comment telling me the title of your favorite Historical novel- this gets you one entry. (Please leave email at bottom of comment)

2)Become a follower of my blog- this gets you a second entry. For those of you that are already followers, just leaving a comment automatically gets you a 2nd entry.

Winner will be chosen Thursday, July 14.

A little bit about the book- from the book cover-
"Annabelle Taylor longs for a fresh start. Yet she cannot reveal what brought her to these circumstances. Harrison Graymoor plays the role of Philadelphia's most eligible, yet elusive bachelor. His preference is to remain single...alone. Quite unexpectedly, Annabelle and Harrison are forced into an undesired predicament. What happens when two determined individuals resolve against marriage....but their hearts tell them otherwise?"

To find out more about the author you can check out her website -here

Review on Pieces of Light by Julie Cave

Pieces of Light by Julie Cave

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Well, it’s 2 books for the price of one! You’ll get a who- dunnit mystery suspense novel along with a well thought out apologetics novel all in one story. I guess the question is- do you like both packed into one? This is my first Dinah Harris mystery novel by Julie Cave. The character of Dinah Harris is a former FBI agent having been released from the FBI because of her alcoholic issues that resulted after the loss of her husband and son in a car accident. Dinah is a character who has come a long way in her healing from those days, but she is still learning how to deal and how to live out her new faith.

This storyline is truly intriguing – someone is bombing local churches and Dinah is called in by her former partner, who still believes in her, as a consultant on the case. I love the way the author uses the present and past and goes back and forth as a wonderful literary device to unfold the story piece by piece to the reader; it opens with the convicted bomber on death row and flashes back to a year ago when the case is unfolding. As the story is told and I don’t want to give anything away here, but I believe the reader really does develop empathy for the “bomber” – unique because he/she is the “bad guy”, but then again aren’t we all?

As far as the apologetics side to the novel- there is plenty of it here. The author is logical and systematic in her delivery of the gospel message and its clear and very well laid out. I felt like the argument concerning the political side of separation of church and state was pretty drawn out and I felt that during this section of the book and even the later gospel arguments that I had switched to a Lee Strobel type of book. Here’s the rub for me- as a Christian, I agreed with everything that was written and really appreciated the systematic and logical thinking that went into these parts of the book. As a fiction reader, it took me away from the story and for me that is a red flag because then I am looking at the writer’s choices instead of staying in the story. But like I said before, if you like 2 for the price of 1, then you will really like this book.

Having jumped into the third book in this series without reading the first two always gives me a little disadvantage I feel, as I haven’t read the character’s entire previous story. So, I do want to go back and read the others. The author does a fine job at helping the reader know the main points of the character’s back story. I just would like to read more and see for myself. So when it’s all said and done, I did enjoy this book- lots of different sub plots going on that made the storyline interesting- some romance, political intrigue, and you can even brush up on your thoughts on separation of church and state arguments and apologetics thoughts. A lot packed in there.

Rating- 3.5 stars

Disclosure- I received a free digital copy of this book through the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed are my own.






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Giveaway winner....

Winner for my giveaway is Jane Anne Owen!! Yay Jane Anne- can you please message me with your address and I'll pop it in the mail for you ;) Congrats and enjoy the book!

Review on A Vision of Lucy

A Vision of Lucy by Margaret Brownley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Margaret Brownley, can we please do lunch? I know, a strange way to start out a book review, but sometimes after reading a good book, that’s how I feel and after reading A Vision for Lucy, and discovering that this author is full of humor and spunk, I just know she’d be a hoot to go to lunch with! I could ask her my plethora of questions about her Historical Christian fiction book, like “Are the cute quotes from a lady photographer of the day at the beginning of each chapter true or invented by her own imagination?” An example: “Never say “shoot” when you mean “photograph” especially when talking to a trigger –happy gunslinger”. Or,”What was your inspiration for the spunky photo-taking, jabber a mile a minute when she’s nervous heroine Lucy Fairbanks?” I’d ask her these things before the menus even came.

Onto the storyline- the setting is the little town of Rocky Creek Texas in 1882, a town where everybody knows your name…except for the new guy in town. A man with a secret and labeled incorrectly by a boy who got caught rummaging through his stuff, as a “wild man” and has the whole town on edge. Lucy, photographer extraordinaire, captures a picture of him for the local newspaper and things get misconstrued and it just gets wilder from there. It turns out this “stranger” is named David Wolf and is tall, dark and handsome and a bit brooding as well. He has reason to be, but I’ll let you discover his secrets for yourself between the pages of this book. Of course our spunky and driven photographer Lucy and mysterious and handsome stranger David meet up and together they make quite a pair. There is a secret here and it affects more than just our mysterious David. As the story unfolds, you see the pieces fall into place.

I have to say I really enjoyed this book. There were laugh out loud moments and the character of Lucy was a hoot. I became a fan of her instantly, especially with her tendency to babble on when she is nervous. The deep dark secret was revealed in just the right timing , as things came together and the clues were all there, but alas I did fall for the ‘red herring” that presented itself , so good job fooling me! Women’s suffrage is also woven into the storyline in an interesting way and I enjoyed the historical context woven through this novel. The main character throughout the novel is “searching” for what God has for her and her purpose in life- a common question to us all. The author does a good job in showing the character’s journey in that whole process.

My only little bit of criticism is that I found the description of the male character to be just a tad “mainstream romantic novelish”- “bulging thighs” for example. That is just my own little observation and it’s just my opinion, it just took me out of the story for a minute, so it caught my attention.

So, to sum up, this book was a great read, really enjoyed it and I am recommending it to those that love a Great Historical Christian fiction, romantic, mystery with some laugh out loud humor kind of books. I will definitely be reading more of Margaret Brownley in the future and Margaret, if you are ever in the Seattle area, please look me up - lunch is on me.

Disclosure- I received a Digital review copy of this book through the Booksneeze program in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed in this review are my own.





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Review on The Dragons of Chiril

The Dragons of Chiril: A Novel by Donita K. Paul

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was my first adventure reading Donita K Paul with her Christian Fantasy Book The Dragons of Chiril: A Novel and I doubt it will be my last. This book was chock full of great characters, interesting storylines and adventurous settings to keep the imagination of the reader stirred for sure. I think readers of all ages would really enjoy this fantasy tale.



Our main character Tipper is a girl whose father has disappeared unexplained many years ago. Her mother Lady Peg Schope is seemingly mentally incompetent claiming to always be talking to her absent husband. This leaves Tipper to have to fend for their household to keep things running. As a result, Tipper has sold many pieces of her Father’s artwork in order to make ends meet as her father; Verrin Schope was a well known artist. Unfortunately, three of Verrin Schope’s sculptures (all sold) hold the key to his disappearance in the form of a portal and with their separation a necessary journey to reunite these sculptures becomes most necessary to help save Tipper’s father as well as the world.



Every great fantasy novel always has a noble quest to save the world and this one is no different. My favorite part of this novel is truly the characters, the rag-tag band of travelers that unite to conquer this problem. Assembled in this group are Tipper of course, her always disappearing father Verrin Schope (you’ll have to read the book to see why), Beccarroon, grand parrot and guardian left to watch over Tipper, Beaulomondore, a local artist, Wizard Fenworth (who appears fairly bumbling, but is smarter than meets the eye) and sidekick librarian Librettowit (well named as he is very witty), and of course a handsome prince- love those guys. Together they are in a race against time to save Verrin Schope as well as repair the portal which is starting to crumble things around the countryside- not good. Of course there are dragons in this book which help the travelers out in many ways- transportation for one, as well as the minor dragons have special gifts and talents such as healing, and mood lifting, etc.



I like the way this story moved along, yes there were the good guys and the bad guys and the epic struggle that always takes place with that, but I loved other aspects to the storyline as well, such as the family dynamics that come into play at the end of the novel- which I don’t want to spoil, but I really appreciated that nuance to the story, sometimes the biggest battles that need to be overcome are with our own family. Also important to note is the character of “Wulder” which is the great creator. Much of his wisdom is woven into the story as a guiding force. This is not done in a hit you over the head with it overly preachy kind of way, but naturally done in the fabric of the story.



This book did have a “prequel” feeling to it for me as a first time reader and I can’t help but feel that I will gain more and get a broader feel for these characters if I continue on in this series and read the next book. (Ah, but I’m sure that’s the whole point.) It’s always fun for me to read a “new-author-to me” and I’ll put Donita K. Paul in as a great new fantasy writer.



Disclosure- A free review copy was graciously provided to me through the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed are my own.

The Dragons of Chiril: A Novel


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Ok everyone- my first give away- I am giving away 1 copy of Lee' Stobel's new fiction book The Ambition- reviewed by me down below. To enter this giveaway Please leave me a comment. If you would like to follow me ,that will give you 2 entries to this free giveaway :) Giveaway runs for 1 week so I will announce the winner here on this blog on June 30th. Please leave your email at the end of your comment so that I can contact you easily- Good luck! Sadly, I need to limit this giveaway to the US and Canada. Thanks for your understanding.

Here is a little about the author- Lee Strobel-Atheist-turned-Christian Lee Strobel, the former award-winning legal editor of The Chicago Tribune, is a New York Times best-selling author of more than twenty books and has been interviewed on numerous national TV programs, including ABC, Fox, PBS, and CNN. Well know for his "Case for Christ" books- a jouranlistic approach to proving the truth of the gospel, he now releases his first Fiction release.