The Hidden Life: An Amish Quilt Novel by Adina Senft

I've read a fair amount of Amish books in my lifetime and this ranks up there with some of the better ones I've read. From the moment I opened the book and started reading, I couldn't put it down - well I had to, but I didn't want to. Emma Stoltzfus just felt so real to me and was a character that I could relate to and I found myself wondering what else was going to happen to her.

This story is the 2nd book in the Amish Quilt Novels though it isn't stated as the 2nd book. I did read the first book, but I don't think that someone who hadn't read that one would find it hard to read this one without the background.

The story of Emma Stoltzfus is one of an "old maid" - well at least I'm guessing in the world of the Amish. She is only 30, but she has never been courted and stays home watching her elderly mother. In her spare time, she loves to write and sends off many recipes and various pieces to the Amish periodicals. The book opens with her sending off a book to a national contest for fiction. She isn't sure how things will turn out, but ends up doing quite well and ranks 7th out of thousands of manuscripts.

Shortly after that, she gets an offer from a literary agent to sell her book. She heads to New York City out of curiosity and to avoid some drama at home and then comes back to her Amish life. For 12 years, she hasn't had any prospects for marriage and in just the space of a few weeks, she has 3 different Amish men interested in her but her heart belongs to only one of them.

I really enjoyed this story and couldn't wait for the ending, but I found the ending to be very abrupt. I'm hoping that more of her story is told in the next book because otherwise I'll be very disappointed. Other than the abrupt ending, this book was so enjoyable. While it isn't full of mystery there was enough of wondering "what will happen next?" to keep me reading until the last page.

I would highly recommend this to anyone that likes to read Amish fiction.

I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review through Faith Words a division of Hachette Book Group. I was under no obligation to give this a positive review. All thoughts in this blog are my own. 

Submerged by Dani Pettrey

This book was excellent. I love suspenseful books and this book did not disappoint. I generally don't like reading Christian Suspense books because they just usually aren't that suspenseful to me and seem to be easy to figure out, but this book kept me reading and captivated. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. 

Summary:

Bailey Craig heads back to a small Alaskan town to say her final goodbyes to an aunt that was killed in a plane crash. She never expected to go back to the town that had made her life miserable during a rough time in her life, but she cares more about her aunt and realizes she needs to pay her respects. While she is trying to go through her aunt's belongings to settle her estate, she gets involved in solving her aunt's murder. 

While solving the murder using her knowledge of Russian history, she gets to know Cole McKenna again and falls in love with him all over again. She longs for a relationship with him, but isn't sure if he can forgive her past. 

While I did enjoy reading this book, I did find that at times the main character got really caught up on the fact that nobody could forgive her for what she had done and that even though she realized that God had forgiven her that people wouldn't be able to. It just seemed at times to detract from the story. I still loved this book and couldn't wait to read her next book in this series (hopefully you'll be seeing my review of that book in the next few weeks). 

I received this free book from Bethany House in exchange for an honest review. The opinions on this blog are my own and I was under no obligation to give a positive review. 

Love in Disguise by Carol Cox

What an enjoyable book to read. I would have loved to have read this book in a sitting or two, but that didn't happen because life has been pretty hectic for me lately. In spite of my crazy life lately, I grabbed this book and read a bit of it every chance I could. When I wasn't reading this book, I'd find myself thinking of the plot line and the characters and wondering what was going to happen next - signs of an excellent book in my opinion. 

Summary:

Ellie Moore is working as an assistant to a famous actress and is sure that her next place is going to be touring Europe. When she unexpectantly loses her job and is struggling to make ends meet, she hears a couple of Pinkerton Agents discussing needing a female to work a job in Arizona. Wanting to get away from the cold streets of Chicago and also to have money to buy food, she tries to get the job. 

Without going into too many details, she ends up living in Arizona as a Pinkerton Agent and faces many challenges including leading a double life in more ways than one. This book has a lot of different twists and turns and you are kept wondering how everything is going to be resolved in the end. 

Fortunately the book does not disappoint as it did have a satisfying ending (at least to me). 

I received this book for free through Bethany House in exchange for an honest review. I was under no obligation to give a positive review. 

Tidewater Inn by Colleen Coble

 

 

 

I enjoyed reading this book for the most part. I had never read a Colleen Coble book before, so I wasn't really sure what to expect, though I think I recall hearing this author's name before in a positive light, which is why I chose this book to review in the first place. I found a lot of the book rather predictable for a "suspense" novel, though I guess in its defense it is classified as "Fiction/Christian/Romance" so that was tagged correctly.

 

 

This book is about Libby who longs for a family of her own and finds out that she has just inherited a house from a father that she thought had died when she was five. No sooner does she find out she has a family, her business partner gets kidnapped and she is the one that the authorities think did it. She ends up trying to find her kidnapped business partner with the aid of one other person in the town, so she can clear her name.

 

While I read this quickly and was looking forward to finding out the mystery, it wasn't much of a mystery. I'm not saying this book wasn't enjoyable. If you are looking for a book that takes your mind off of things then this book will do the trick.

 

 

I received this book in exchange for an honest review through the BookSneeze program, I was under no obligation to give it a positive review. All thoughts and opinions are my own. 



 

For Such a Time as This by Ginny Aiken

 

Because this book was so enjoyable to read, I found it hard to put down. The characters were believable and struggled with many things that I've struggled with so that helped me to be able to identify with the characters right off the bat. This book takes place in the 1870's in Oregon and so has the "old West" kind of feel with the small town that has a General Store, bank and church and not a lot else.

The book starts with nineteen year old Olivia Moore praying that she can somehow help her family out since they've fallen on hard times due to droughts and grasshopper plagues. She certainly isn't expecting God to answer her prayer by allowing a pig to cross her path and some young boys falling shortly behind, but that is how God opens the up the way for her to become a nanny for one of the young boys and his older sister.

She starts working for the President of the local bank as his children's companion and due to circumstances end up entering into marriage as strictly a business proposal and she is to have no say in the bank. Meanwhile, her family is sent a letter signed by the President of the local bank stating that they have been foreclosed on and will be losing their homestead if they don't pay soon. Torn between loyalty to her family and her husband, she isn't sure what to do and starts wondering if God led her to that family for "Such a Time as This".

As I said earlier, I really did enjoy reading this book. The plot really wasn't complicated and so it made a nice easy read - something to take your mind off of things and to curl up to at the end of a stressful work day. I'd highly recommend this book if you enjoy "Old West" kind of books. There is just something about reading about other peoples' troubles that helps take your mind off of your own.

I received this complimentary book from Faith Words in exchange for an honest review. All of the thoughts in this post are my own. I was under no obligation to give it a positive review.

Unstuck: Your Life. God's Design. Real Change. by Arnie Cole & Michael Ross

As Christians, we often get in a rut with our spiritual lives. Hard times may come and we don't know why things are going wrong and we wonder if God even cares. We question why this is happening to us and sometimes we even wonder if it is worth following God. After all, if He truly loved us like He said He does would He allow this to happen to me?

I don't know the excuses for every believer, but I know my excuses. I know that I've wondered many times how do I live a life that is honoring to God. How do I have a passion for Christ - continually? There always seem to be questions and often it seems hard to get any answers.

When I saw that this book touched on the very topic of many of my questions, I jumped at the chance to read it. The answer is simple: read your Bible. As you read your Bible, God is able to communicate to you in a very real way.

For most Christians, I doubt this book is going to have a "new" solution for you. But their whole point is we don't know God and we don't know what He would have for us because we aren't reading His Words to us. It isn't a hard answer, though it can be a very difficult thing to do.

This book addresses many of the excuses that we give for not reading the Bible and goes into how profitable it is to read your Bible at least 4 days a week to see continual growth. Even though I'm telling you more about a book than I normally would, I don't feel that this is going to "ruin" the book and its contents for you.

The authors are very down-to-earth and share many stories of other believers who have been stuck in a rut and how the Bible has transformed them. They even include their own stories.

I really enjoyed reading this book even though it really wasn't eye-opening it was a good reminder of where we find the source of our life. This book would make an awesome study for an individual or for a Bible study group. The end of each chapter gives a Scripture passage to remember and a thought to consider. It asks questions to make you think about what is going on in your own spiritual walk with God.

I would highly recommend this book to anybody that is struggling in their spiritual walk because it had such practical applications.

I received this book for free through Bethany House and was under no obligation to give it a positive review. All the thoughts in this blog are my own. 

If You Have a Craving, I Have a Cure by Sheri Rose Shepherd

It seems every time I get super excited about a book being sent to me to review, I am always disappointed by it. Once again, this was the case.

This book was very easy to read as long as you are reading it as a book only, I read it in about an hour and a half. I can see how this book would also be easy to flip to each chapter as the individual "cravings" arise.

The "faith" aspect of this book seemed very shallow to me. However, there were a few good ideas that got me thinking.

The "food" aspect of this book seemed like recipes I'd never even try. Part of this may be that I'm allergic to many of the ingredients in the various recipes, but honestly I'm not into eating gluten-free and eating only "whole" foods. I'm sure this is a poor reflection on me and not necessarily on this book, but for someone who likes to actually enjoy the food they eat, I'll pass on these recipes.

Overall, this book was a big disappointment to me. I was really hoping that the recipes would be using what I consider normal everyday foods as the basis of their recipes so that it would be easier to incorporate and change my eating style, but when some of the ingredients are things I've never heard of, I'll pass.

If you like shallow spiritual books, or if you are just looking for a lot of "gluten-free" or "whole" food recipes this may be the book for  you. As for me, I'm going to have to pass on this one.

 

I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review from Tyndale Publishers, I was under no obligation to give a positive review. All the thoughts and opinions in this post are my own.