For The Love Of Books

I’ve been having a lot of firsts this year, and I am thankful for all of the new to me authors I am finding! While Rachel Hauck has been around for a while, I finally picked up one of her books based on recommendations. It was fantastic! Set on the island of St Simon in Georgia, it had just enough of our Georgia flair mixed with European monarchy. I am not as big of a fan of contemporary as I am historical, but I’ve already checked out the next 2 in this series!! This book is not filled with twaddle, but it had me staying up late (and avoiding house cleaning) while trying to finish it up. ❤️

This novella is a follow up to Once Upon a Prince and revisits the main characters in a way that helps us wrap up the main points of their romance. I enjoyed it - it was a fast read, but just because it was short, doesn’t mean it doesn’t pack a big punch!

If you haven’t already, *run* and get this book pre-ordered!! It releases on Tuesday, 7/2, and is simply  fantastic!!! Connilyn has done it again and woven a tale that makes it hard to put down. With careful research into the period she writes, she holds fast to Biblical truths while using the gaps to weave her own stories of characters I’ve come to love even if I will never meet them in real life! This book captivated me from the moment I began reading it. I am normally a person who will bounce between books until I get to the final third of a book, and then I will finish that specific one off (right now I’m in the middle of 3 others). Well, not so with this book! Once I started, I did not even want to pick up any of the other books! I clung to this one and sought out any chance to read that I could find. While drawing a parallel between a New Testament parable, Connilyn transports us to a time of betrothals, indentured servants, arranged marriages, and cities of refuge for ...

This is the second book I’ve read by Susan Anne Mason, and I’m still blown away! It did take me a little while to get into this one, but once I was into it, I didn’t want to stop reading. I love how she loosely tied the first book into this one and gave us the glimpse that this was happening at the same time as the previous Canadian Crossings Book. I’ve already checked another of her books out from the library, so I’m definitely planning to read more by this author!

Final review for today and perhaps my favorite one! Colleen Coble’s Butterfly Palace is a story that had me staying up late at night - I remember now why I don’t read too many suspense/mystery type of books - they’re hard to break away from! Once again I love how Colleen just jumps right in to the story line and it doesn’t take you long to place what happens on the back cover. I was second guessing myself the entire way through (always thinking I had all the answers!!). Fabulous story - just the right balance of romance, mystery, and intrigue all done in a suspenseful way!

This little gem was an ebook I found that comes after Colleen Coble’s The Butterfly Palace. This is a short story titled Bluebonnet Bride and follows a side sequel story over one of the characters in The Butterfly Palace as well as touching in on the other main character’s lives and allowing you to get a glimpse of where they ended up a few years later. Colleen packed romance, suspense, and mystery into this short story in a way that convinced me to stay and finish it in one sitting.

This book had me hooked from the start! I love how Colleen Coble jumps right in and doesn’t make you wait to get the the synopsis on the back cover. This book is fast paced and had me trying to solve the mystery all the way through. Very well written with characters you fall in love with as well as ones you fall out of love with as the story progresses.

Wow!!! Another brilliant new to me author! I had never read nor heard of this author before a Facebook group I am part of did a book club based around this book. No offense meant by that, but I feel like I was living under a rock until recently when this group opened up my eyes to tooons of different authors! Pepper Basham’s writing touched my soul with this one. I never laugh out loud when reading. Like, I rarely even smile. I always do it internally, but I’m an introvert and not very expressive like that. This book had me laughing out loud before I knew what was happening! But, after turning the page, I was suddenly crying! Then laughing on the next page! Pepper portrayed the mountain people in a way that I feel was extremely appropriate. The language got me in the mood for a historic mountain tale. The kindred spirit of the mountain people was thoroughly expressed. I am not very familiar with the Blue Ridge Mountain people, but I do know that I went to the Smoky Mountains after ...

Jill Eileen Smith revealed the cover her team has put together for her newest upcoming novel yesterday! It is absolutely gorgeous!! Jill Eileen Smith is one of my top five favorite Biblical fiction authors and I have read all of her phenomenal books to date ❤️  Synopsis: In an effort to complete a war his father had planned to win, King Xerxes calls every governor, satrap, and official in his vast kingdom to his palace in Susa to strategize and feast. When they finally leave, he decides on one more week of frivolity, which ends in the banishment of his favorite wife, something he never intended to do. But when he discovers Esther, Xerxes is sure he has a second chance at happiness. In her wildest dreams, Esther could never have imagined that she would end up as queen of Persia. Yet she knows better than to become complacent. Another of Xerxes's wives is vying for position, and his closest advisor has a deep and dangerous grudge against Esther's adoptive father. Caught in...