FTC: I received a free copy of this book from Litfuse in exchange for my honest review. I received no other compensation and the opinions expressed in this review are one hundred percent true and my own.
Keturah by Lisa T. Bergren was a sweet story. I love that the author made the main character’s strong independent women because it isn’t commonly done in books that happen during the 1700’s. This is the first book that I have read by this author, and I can’t wait to read others especially more in this series. I think I loved Verity the most and I hope that she will be one of the main characters in the next book. Since this book is a historical fiction novel, I did get bored from time to time because I always have a hard time staying interested when books take place this much is the past. I spent the entire book rooting for Keturah to come out on top. If you love reading historical fiction books that have a strong female lead than I know you will like this book as much as I did.
About The Book
In 1772 England, Lady Keturah Banning Tomlinson and her sisters find themselves the heiresses of their father’s estates and know they have one option: Go to the West Indies to save what is left of their heritage.
Although it flies against all the conventions, they’re determined to make their own way in the world. But once they arrive in the Caribbean, conventions are the least of their concerns. On the infamous island of Nevis, the sisters discover the legacy of the legendary sugar barons has vastly declined-and that’s just the start of what their eyes are opened to in this harsh and unfamiliar world.
Keturah never intends to put herself at the mercy of a man again, but every man on the island seems to be trying to win her hand and, with it, the ownership of her plantation. She could desperately use an ally, but even an unexpected reunion with a childhood friend leaves her questioning his motives.
To keep her family together and save the plantation that is her last chance at providing for them, can Keturah ever surrender her stubbornness and guarded heart to God and find the healing and love awaiting her?
About The Author
Lisa T. Bergren has published more than 40 books with more than 3 million books sold combined. She’s the author of the Christy Award-winning “Waterfall,” RITA®-finalist “Firestorm,” bestselling “God Gave Us You,” and popular historical series like Homeward, Grand Tour, and more. She’s also a recipient of the RT Lifetime Achievement Award. She lives in Colorado Springs with her husband and three teen-and-older children.
A too-young queen must learn to control her powers in order to save her empire, but can she trust the man who’s taught her to use her gift?
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Title: Web of Frost
Author: Lindsay Smith
Genre: YA Fantasy
Release Date: February 13, 2018
Publisher: Eventide Press
Series: The Saints of Russalka
Page Count: 402 pages
Format: Digitial
ASIN: B078X1K8VP
ISBN-13: 9781370549054
The saints of Russalka work their blessings in mysterious ways, allowing the royal family to perform miracles for their people. But the young princess Katza fears her powers. She’s seen grave visions of her bloodied hands destroying her family’s empire. When her older brother succumbs to illness, leaving her next in line for the throne, Katza turns to a young rebellious prophet named Ravin who promises to teach her how to control her gift. As unrest grows in Russalka and a foreign monarchy threatens, Ravin understands Katza’s fears and helps her find confidence in her gift, and her own heart. Under Ravin’s unorthodox training, Katza learns to hear the saints once more—until revolutionaries claim her father’s life.
Reeling and desperate, Katza draws upon darker and darker powers to stop the revolutionaries, the foreign invaders, and the members of her own court who would see her fail. But the more Ravin whispers in her ear, the more Katza questions whether he—and the saints—have her best interests at heart. She must choose between her love of Ravin and her love of Russalka itself—and decide whether her empire might not be better off without her.
Ravin stood silent in the doorway, his clasped hands a speck of pale flesh against the black velvet of his coat and trousers. Her thoughts soared at the sight of him. She needed his counsel to make sense of her latest vision. She needed his guidance. She needed—him.
She tangled her fingers in the bedsheets and twisted them, uncomfortable with the sudden yearning that pricked at her skin.
“Prophet.” Katza’s voice cracked. She turned toward the physicker. “Please, allow us to speak privately.”
The physicker exchanged looks with Nadika, who hovered in the corner of the bedchamber. Nadika nodded, and the physicker gathered his bag and left.
Ravin moved inside, quiet as snow, and closed the door. Nadika posted herself in the doorway as he sat in the physicker’s chair at Katza’s side. Dark crescents lurked under his eyes, and his skin looked more pallid than usual. Katza felt a sudden urge to brush those crescents with her thumbs, as if they were smudges she could wipe away.
“Are you all right?” Ravin asked softly. “I’ve been worried for you. I prayed for you all evening.”
Embers flared on Katza’s cheeks as she imagined him kneeling in the chapel . . . imagined her name on his lips. “I—I’m fine now. But I had a vision.” She pitched her voice low. “A new one. There was gunfire, or cannons perhaps, in the distance. And I was bleeding.” She gripped her stomach instinctively. “I think in the vision I’d been shot.”
Ravin pressed his palms together and tapped the tips of his fingers to his mouth. “It was similar to other visions of yours, was it not?”
Katza’s jaw clenched. For a moment, she was afraid to speak, so she nodded instead. She still wasn’t prepared to tell him about her recurring vision—the one she’d first feared this might be, too. He’d hinted before that he knew of it already, but how was that possible? Had the saints warned him as well? Better to keep it to herself until she could be sure.
“Yes. I sense this is a common theme for you.” He glanced down. “I believe that Boj is warning you—warning that great strife is coming to Russalka. That if you are not prepared to confront it, you will not survive.”
A horrifying possibility, to be sure. Yet it was better than the vision she’d been plagued with before. If she couldn’t find a way to stop the strife, though, would Russalka still perish? Whether it was at her hands or not, it had to be stopped.
“And if I am prepared?” Katza asked.
“Then it can be avoided.” The angles of his face softened by a fraction. Katza’s gaze traced the delicate swoop from his cheek toward his mouth and lips, the hollows beneath his cheekbones. “You have been chosen by Boj to do great things. Greater even than most Silovs are capable of.” He looked right at her, something gleaming in his eyes. Something like awe. “But your training has been stunted.”
Katza squeezed her eyes shut to guard against a rush of despair. “It’s my fault. My visions—I thought they were warning me not to step above my place.”
“You thought they warned you not to act?” he asked. “And yet they continued? Tsarechka . . . I think perhaps they were warning you of the cost of inaction.”
Katza choked back a sour laugh. When she opened her eyes again, Ravin was watching her, his face warm despite that leeching cold in his eyes. She wanted to believe him. Desperately. She couldn’t put into words, though, the vision’s warning—the certainty she’d felt of its message. That she was doomed to be Russalka’s death.
But maybe she was wrong. She yearned to be wrong. Maybe, with Ravin’s aid, she could avoid its grim outcome.
“You are unprepared now, but you will learn. With the right training, you can save Russalka.”
Her gaze drifted down his face and along the long, stern line of his arms. His hands, so like a sculptor’s, dexterous and slim. This close to him, she smelled incense on his clothes, spiced like cinnamon and cloves. She wanted to wrap herself in that scent. Throat tight, she reached out for his hand. At first he tensed, but then his shoulders softened, and a smile teased his mouth. Their fingers knitted together, and she let the weight of her hand sink into his.
Lindsay is the author of the young adult novels Sekret, Dreamstrider, and A Darkly Beating Heart, and is the showrunner and lead writer for Serial Box’s The Witch Who Came In From the Cold. Her work has appeared on Tor.com and in the anthologies A Tyranny of Petticoats, Strange Romance Vol. 3, and Toil & Trouble, and she has written for Green Ronin Publishing’s RPG properties. She lives in Washington, DC with her husband and dog.
FTC: I received a free copy of this book from Pump Up Your Book in exchange for my honest review. I received no other compensation and the opinions expressed in this review are one hundred percent true and my own.
The Runaway Rock Star by Veronica Blade was a sweet romance novel. I feel in love with the Liam right from the start, and because of that, I was able to finish this book pretty fast. I read this book in two days because I didn’t want to put it down. I also loved Emma’s daughter because she reminded me so much of my nephew and kids that age always makes me smile. I loved how hard working Emma was and how she was a great mother. I knew how this book would end even though I didn’t know the exact way things would happen. I loved that this book didn’t have over the top sex scenes in it. There weren’t any parts of this book that made me uncomfortable reading it, and I don’t think that it would really offend anyone else either. If you don’t like super-explicit sex scenes than I know you will enjoy this book. I loved the setting of this book as well. I can’t wait to pick up more books by this author in the future.
About The Book
NOTE: As with all Veronica Blade books, this is a sweet, semi-clean romance.
An infamous bad-boy rocker falls for a small-town girl who has no idea who he is. Considering his reputation, that’s probably a good thing.
After his latest escapade splashes across the tabloids, Grammy-winning bad-boy Liam Blackwell questions his own choices. He alters his appearance, hits the road and drives until hunger forces him to stop at The Wagon Wheel. Mesmerized by the pretty bartender, he lingers and, with each passing moment, staying becomes easier to imagine. But he doesn’t do relationships and Emma isn’t a one-night kind of girl. And when this small-town girl learns all about his big city life, wouldn’t she dump him anyway?
When a stranger walks into The Wagon Wheel wearing leather and a sexy grin, Emma Taylor is instantly drawn to him. But raising a child alone is hard enough at twenty-one without adding his kind of trouble into the mix. Though Emma sees more in Liam beyond the bruised knuckles and tattoos, she can’t risk temptation again or allow herself to hope for love, because when he inevitably blows out of town, he’ll just be another guy who broke her heart.
About The Author
Brain candy. Cleansing your reading palate one book at a time.
Veronica Blade lives in Southern California with her husband and children. By day she runs the family business, but each night she slips away to spin her tales. She writes stories about young adults to relive her own childhood and to live vicariously through her characters. Except her heroes and heroines lead far more interesting lives — and they are always way hotter.
A girl who can’t remember. A book you won’t forget.
From debut author Margarita Montimore.
Astrid can’t remember the best day of her life: yesterday.
A traumatic car accident erases Astrid s memories of September 9th, the day she spent with an oddly charming stranger named Theo. Ever since, she’s been haunted by surreal dreams and an urgent sense that she’s forgotten something important.
One night, she gets a mysterious call from Oliver, who knows more about her than he should and claims he can help her remember. She accepts his help, even as she questions his motives and fights a strange attraction to him.
In order to find Theo and piece together that lost day in September, Astrid must navigate a maze of eccentric Boston nightlife, from the seedy corners of Chinatown to a drug-fueled Alice-in-Wonderland-themed party to a club where everyone dresses like the dead.
In between headaches and nightmares, she struggles to differentiate between memory, fantasy, and reality, and starts to wonder if Theo really exists. Eventually, she ll need to choose between continuing her search for him or following her growing feelings for Oliver.
Astrid might go to extreme lengths to find what she’s lost… or might lose even more in her pursuit to remember (like her sanity).
“Simply riveting from start to finish… a captivating, literary piece that winds a path somewhere between mystery, romance, and psychological thriller.” — D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review
“A compelling and original take on the classic amnesia tale . . . The narrative bursts with detailed, vivid characters . . . The dialogue is expertly crafted.” – The BookLife Prize
“There is so much to love about this book. The writing is wonderful… The joy of this book is following all of its twists and turns and going on Astrid’s journey with her as she tries to determine what is real and what isn’t.” — GSMC Book Review
“This book ticked all my boxes: unusual narrative structure, setting as a character, witty banter, and whip-smart writing… I loved it, and I’ll be thinking about it for a long time.”
— Rachel Lynn Solomon, author of You’ll Miss Me When I’m Gone
“Every part of this book was confidently crafted to create this dreamy, charismatic experience of being utterly submerged in a mystery and desperately seeking truth.”
— Michelle Hazen, author of A Cruel Kind of Beautiful
Outside a pizza place is a pay phone. Who else can I call? Hand on receiver, before I can decide, the phone rings. I pull back, like I’ve been burned.
Briiiiiing!!! Briiiiiing!!!
There’s absolutely nobody around, no one who might be waiting for a call.
Briiiiiing!!!
“Hello?” Why am I answering the phone? It’s not like—
“Astrid?”
If déjà vu is a feather down the spine, this sensation is a razor.
I must have misheard.
“Astrid, are you there?” The same male voice from my dream, the static now on my end in the form of the noisy downpour.
“Who is this?” I ask. “How did you know I would answer the phone?”
Before he replies, tranquility trickles into my veins like one of those lovely drugs pumped into me at the hospital. Of course. There’s no need to worry about any of it. This is just another dream.
“You’ll find out who I am soon enough,” he says. “There are more important things you need to deal with first.”
“Sure there are. Like what kind of snack I’ll have when I wake up.”
A pause on his end. “You’re not dreaming, Astrid.”
It stops raining, abruptly.
“The car accident, the fire, your friend’s overdose,” he continues, “All of those are real things.”
“Who are you? You’re scaring me.” I look around, expect to see someone lurking in a dark trench coat.
“I’m sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have called. But I wanted… to reassure you, tell you you’ll get through this. I’ll be able to help you more later on.”
“Do you…” My mouth is parched, my voice hoarse. “Do you go by your middle name?” I clear my throat, hold onto the phone with both hands. “Please tell me your name.”
“You already know my name, Astrid. You just need to remember it. But first, you need to find a place to sleep.”
“You mean a place to wake up. Right here would be perfect.”
He sighs. “Don’t do that. Don’t deny what’s real.”
How am I supposed to tell the difference?
“Astrid, you’re going to be fine. That’s all I wanted to tell you. We’ll speak again soon.”
The line goes dead.
Author Bio:
Margarita Montimore received a BFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College. She worked for over a decade in publishing and social media before deciding to focus on the writing dream full-time. She has blogged for Marvel, Google, Quirk Books, and XOJane.com. When not writing, she freelances as a book coach and editor. She grew up in Brooklyn but currently lives in a different part of the Northeast with her husband and dog.
Margarita writes upmarket/literary fiction that tends to be left of center and flirt with multiple genres. While she loves all things dark, strange, and surreal, she’s also optimistic—verging on quixotic—and a pop culture geek, so her work tends to incorporate all those elements to varying degrees.
I chose a quote by James A. Baldwin for this week’s quote.
When I saw this quote I knew I wanted to use it because I think it is one of the truest quotes that I have read in quite awhile. I say that because look what happened in Florida last week. It makes me sad that there are people in this world who have no problem going into a school or any other location and kill complete strangers because they are mad and feel like they have nothing to lose. I wish that the government would do something to try make these mass shootings stop. I have no idea how we can stop them but I think it is time to sit down and figure it out. Those are just a few of my thoughts on this quote. I also want everyone to know that my thoughts and prayers are with the people in Florida who are having to deal with this situation.
What do you think about this week’s quote by James A. Baldwin?
FTC: I received a free copy of this book from Litfuse in exchange for my honest review. I received no other compensation and the opinions expressed in this review are one hundred percent true and my own.
Real-Life Romance by Rhonda Stoppe was a sweet book. I did enjoy all of the stories in this book, and almost all of them left me with a smile on my face. I also loved that the author gives you points to ponder and things that you should ask yourself and think about. I love that the author doesn’t quote tons of scriptures while telling the story but she does give you some of the points that you should ponder. If you are looking for ways to grow as a couple, I think this book could help you. Since I am single, I just enjoyed the stories, and that is all. I am one hundred percent, okay being single, so I just pick up these kinds of books to break up some of the other types of books that I read. If you are looking for something sweet to read I think that this book would be an excellent fit for you.
About The Book
Do you believe in true love?
In a world of broken relationships and hurting people, it can seem like all we ever see is heartache-that marriages are doomed from the start and romance isn’t worth the risk.
But heart-fluttering, long-lasting love is all around us…we just have to look for it!
This collection of beautiful, real-life accounts will bring laughter and tears as you enjoy each story of ordinary people who found extraordinary love. Page after page, you will find inspiration to
-rekindle the romance in your love story
-trust in God’s providence and timing
-faithfully hope for your own happily-ever-after
-celebrate true romance
-believe in life-long love
Don’t let the world define romance for you! See how God is at work in the hearts of His people-knitting together hearts in a love that forever endures.
About The Author
Rhonda Stoppe is the No Regrets Woman. With more than 20 years of experience as a pastor’s wife, mom, mentor, author, and speaker, Rhonda uses humor and honest communication to help women build No Regrets Lives. She and her husband live their real-life romance in northern California, and have four grown children and eight grandchildren.
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