1.Anathema byColleen Coble from Thomas Nelson. An Amish woman who fled after a murder is drawn back to her peaceful community--and a spiraling danger.

2.Bayou Judgment, Bayou Series book 3 byRobin Caroll from Steeple Hill Love Inspired Suspense. Crisis hot line counselor finds herself in the midst of murder and mayhem, and tough-guy preacher must fight to keep her safe.

3.Beyond the Night byMarlo Schalesky from Multnomah Books. A woman going blind, a man who loves her but can’t tell her so, a crash, a hospital room, and an ending that must be experienced to be believed.

4.Blood Brothers byRick Acker from Kregel Publications. Sibling rivalry, black market deals, and a dangerous new wonder drug interrupt Ben Corbin's plans for early retirement in this riveting sequel to Dead Man's Rule.

5.Controlling Interest byElizabeth White from Zondervan. Matt Hogan and Natalie Tubberville compete to find a missing mail-order bride, with Matt's detective agency in the balance--or is love the ultimate prize?

6.Deadly Exposure byCara Putman from Love Inspired Suspense. With a stalker closing in, will television journalist Dani Richards trust her former love and police investigator Caleb Jamison to help her and God to rescue her?

7.Divorcing the Devil byDwan Abrams from Urban Christian. Drama, heartbreak, violence, and redemption. Will anyone be spared when trying to divorce the devil?

8.Flame From Within byShirley Kiger Connolly from Vintage Romance Publishing. Amethyst Rose, inflamed by the devastating war flees her beloved Vicksburg and becomes entangled with two passionate and enamored Yankee warriors and a deceitful Frenchman determined to steal her heart...perhaps her soul.

9.Fossil Hunter byJohn B. Olson from Tyndale House. A Christian paleontologist makes a dangerous discovery -- a fossil that doesn't seem to fit current evolutionary theory.

10.It's All About Us All About Us book one byShelley Adina from FaithWords. Can a Christian teenager stay true to her faith and still get the most popular guy in school?

11.Journey to Judah "Born for India" series Book One byEileen Rife from Capstone Fiction. In an exotic culture of 7.5 million people and over 3 million gods, one woman resolves to follow her heart.

12.Leave it to Chance bySherri Sand from David C. Cook. After three long years of single motherhood, Sierra Montgomery can finally stand on her own two feet—until a gift horse threatens her finances, her family, and her budding relationship with a handsome landscaper.

13.Ruby Among Us byTina Ann Forkner from Waterbrook Press. Sometimes the key to your future lies in someone else's past. Ruby Among Us is a stirring story about faith and mother-daughter love.

14.Sandhill Dreams, Book 2 Nebraska Brides byCara C. Putman from Heartsong Presents. With her dreams shattered, will Lainie Gardner allow God and a soldier at Fort Robinson to breathe life into new dreams that will bring her more joy than she imagined?

15.The Black Cloister byMelanie Dobson from Kregel Publications. When Elise Friedman travels to Germany to research her family's mysterious past, she uncovers a chilling secret and a man who threatens to destroy her.

16.The Duchess and the Dragon byJamie Carie from B&H Publishing. A passionate duke meets a lovely Quaker girl and finds it was worth losing everything to have her.

17.The Taste of Good Fruit byMaRita Teague from Walk Worthy Press and Harrison House Publishing House. A tragic loss, a devastating secret, and a seductive mistake are insurmountable challenges that take close friends, Sydney, Chanel, and Sherese, on a journey towards self-discovery, strengthened friendship, and renewed faith.

18.Trion Rising, Book one in the Shadowside trilogy byRobert Elmer from Zondervan. What would it be like if Jesus had come to another planet?

19.Wagered Heart byRobin Lee Hatcher from Zondervan. Bethany Silverton can’t resist the challenge of charming a rough cowboy, but when she makes an innocent wager, unexpected results could turn a little flirtation into a lifetime of love.

20.With Endless Sight, Crossroads of Grace #3 byAllison Pittman from Multnomah Waterbrook. When disaster strikes her family, fourteen-year-old Belinda finds herself alone until God delivers her to the unlikely sanctuary of a brothel in the Wyoming mountains.

Happy reading ~

a piece of ireland

 

Boys and Toys - Growing up in New Zealand

(Left: May Mission)
I grew up surrounded by boys in every direction - only one brother, but two male cousins and several sets of neighbours and friends put the total at twelve or so. Unlike the rest, my brother and I were homeschooled. Up until the age of ten or eleven, this consisted of reading and re-reading the stock of books owned by my parents, and those hauled home from the library. Sometimes I drew or sewed or built something, but mostly it was the books that pulled me in. But I ate my Weet-Bix just like every other Kiwi kid and dashed out to eat fruit off the trees while the cool grass tickled the soles of my feet.

Each day I would wait eagerly of three o’clock when the others would get out of school and come to play. We ran wild in the park, in trees and gardens, and in the patch of bush between our neighbourhood and the start of the industrial area in the Wairau valley. On weekends, when the factories closed, we zoomed on bikes around their adventurously sloped carparks and driveways tangled around the network of cul-de-sacs. When the park was mowed, we scurried about to gather armfuls of fragrant cut grass, with which we built walls, houses and furnishings on the wide green spaces. We took turns at pulling the flying fox to the tower for each other, while yet others waited below at the point where you’d begin to lose speed - ready to catch the rope’s tail and propel you to the far end for a second, shorter thrill ride. We climbed trees and built platforms in them from wood scraps.

We went to zoos and museums and beaches in two or three carloads, sometimes with a few kids in the boot of Dad’s old French stationwagon - before the days when it became illegal. Once on the motorway at high speed, the hatch opened when two boys were in the back, but Mum was able to pull over before anything happened. The backseat was empty that day because the boot was, just, well, cooler.

Those were the days when “choice” was a word of high praise, when a frozen Fruju was the epitome of summer happiness at the beach. Mr. Whippy’s van would blare Greensleeves from its horn and we’d run up to the street to get a choc-dipped Flake cone. We’d come home with sand all through our clothes, bags and hair, and starving from hours in the sun and salt water. But the milkman’s siren would creep ever closer and I’d have to rocket down to the bottom of the drive with Mum’s small change jingling in my pocket, so as not to run out of milk. That would keep us from eating Weet-Bix in the morning, and we couldn’t have that.

We built huge Lego constructions that sometimes , and taped wild zig-zags of empty toilet rolls, cut-off plastic bottles and other junk to the ragged wallpaper in my room to make “marble machines” as we called them - then we’d pour marbles in the top end and patch up any spots where they escaped before landing in the yoghurt pot at the bottom.

In the May holidays, the church used to put on children’s programmes which everyone called the May Mission. I don’t know what they call it now - since the school terms were rearranged, there’s been no holidays in May for years. Anyway, for that week we’d gather up all the boys and ferry them to the church hall to sing songs, learn Bible verses, and play games like newspaper bat-ball, Duck Duck Goose, Matthew Mark, and Hit the Deck. And let’s not forget the church camps, where there was more of the same - day and night. The campsite had three giant flying foxes, which was the main attraction for us kids.

One winter Dad and I spent many evenings down in the garage, making a huge mural of Noah’s Ark with all the animals. Fabric and wool and paint were applied to a wide roll of newsprint paper. When it was done, the whole family showed it to visitors by holding it up in a circle to walk around them. It was too long to stretch our straight in any one room.

With Mum we’d go shopping in our bare feet, which was chilly in the freezer aisle, but shoes are no fun anyway. Afterwards we’d pop into the library next door and check out books, and videos from the children’s section - most notably one called Music Box where a man in a dreary city discovered a song to make him happy. Each time he opened the music box, dancing black angels in white tuxedos would appear and sing Gospel Hallelujas. We loved that story, watching how the joy changed that man’s life as he passed it on.

On weekends in New Zealand, houses for sale are opened to the public. We visited a great many, but never found one we liked more than our own dilapidated yellow clapboard by the park. To this day my mother and I look up the open homes and go touring every so often - it’s a stimulating hobby even if we aren’t quite planning on buying. Maybe one day.

We had one cat of our own, and a few from the surrounding houses who liked to hang out with him. One summer the neighbours had kittens, and al of us kids rejoiced in carrying them around the neighbourhood. Of course, we had only our swimming togs on, havinig run a hose out to a plastic sheet laid out on the park hill, where we slipped and slid and cooled off during the long hot days. Or we splashed in plastic pools or sanced through lawn-sprinklers.
And then there’s the other animals. We made ant houses of glass and tape, and watched with great interest when the ants moved in. Later, the cousins gave us a white rat they’d found running wild, and we liked her so much we got five more in all colours, and later some breeding pairs. Every boy that came to our house wanted a rat of his own, you see, though not all of their parents were as impressed with the idea.

My brother talked to dogs along his paper run, got to know their owners, and tooke them for walks at times. Then other times, they’d escape from their yards and come to find him. We borrowed quite a few dogs in this way over the years, but their owners always knew where to find them.

Thus was my childhood in New Zealand - a mingling of sights and sounds and textures, experiences and smells and the unmistakable ambience of each individual situation. Much I have forgotten, but not the richness nor the colours, and not the toys nor the boys.

The Shadow and Night by Chris Walley

CSFF Blog Tour
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1414313276

I have travelled far in the realms of fantasy and sci-fi... to Narnia, Empyrion, Middle Earth, Byntar and Albion, but never have I journeyed so far away as this book has taken me. Nor does anything even come close to the distance we encounter in "The Shadow and Night". As I opened the book and read the first pages, the thought came to me: perhaps this is the story I have been waiting all my life to read - or the tale I have always wanted to write. Well, not quite. But darned close to it.

In the Year of Our Lord 13000, the Lord's Peace is about to come under attack. Over eleven thousand years have passed since the Great Intervention; since that time there have been no wars, indeed no evil at all among humans. The Assembly's far-flung colonies have been created from inhospitable planets over thousands of years of terraforming and atmospheric adjustments.

But I'm not just talking about physical or temporal distance. The people on these worlds are redeemed, almost unfallen, incapable of sin. Far-advanced technologies are a part of daily life, but not overbearingly; simple, useful concepts are a joy to behold, such as the personal diary: a computer, telephone, camera, journal, dictaphone all in one; and the perfection of the Internet to a virtual-reality library containing all the information in the known universe.

The most distant Made World is Farholme, six hundred light years from Earth. Merral, the forester, finds himself an unwilling fighter for the cause of good when he becomes aware of strange happenings at his uncle's farm. The array of characters surrounding Merral is headed by Verofaza, a visitor from Ancient Earth, sent to investigate reports of a possible threat at Farholme.

The sudden re-entry of evil to the universe is all the more terrible because no one has any experience to deal with it, whether on a global or personal level. Temptations go unrecognised at first, and negative feelings are puzzled over as unknowns. Clues to the impending threat are woven in from the beginning, almost utterly harmless to start with, but creeping in with unabated increase of the suspense factor.

The author is an advocate for "slow creation", in other words, God-designed evolution, as this is taken for granted by all the characters. In the story, evolution appears to have passed from being a theory and is presented as a proven fact.

Nonetheless, the writing and the story drew me in from the first page. Descriptions and characters are sharp and vivid, from sunsets to animals to spaceflight, and particularly the unknowing innocence of saintly heroes in the face of insidious evil. Yet they too must grow, and that is what they do.

I’m glad the two books are joined in one volume here, because the first, while ending at a quiet moment, provides no conclusion to the mystery of what is going on. That is the epic quality of these stories; there is no quick-fix solution anywhere to be seen, but at the same time the reader is dragged into a personal journey of unimaginable proportions.

In the second part, things get exciting. If the first part is gripping suspense, then the second is pumping adrenaline. A peaceful people must prepare for war, and the tale moves increasingly from sci-fi to include the realm of fantasy - but it fits. After all, in a tale at the very end of time I would consider it normal for angels and fallen angels to appear. It’s like seeing a war from the inside, up close and personal, with all the emotional reactions of those involved.

Vero changes almost overnight from a timid graduate to a decisive army organiser, studying ancient war histories and pondering a good many Ancient English metaphors along the way. Of course they don’t make much sense to him, but that doesn’t stop him using them. There is also much telling revelation of the first-time soldiers’ initial excitement at battle, followed by the grim horror of reality.

This book will make you think. It will shoot you into the far distant future and make it believable. And it will take you all the way back to the roots of evil, and the triumph of good. If you’re anything like me, it will surprise you, shock you, and bring you to the edge of laughter and tears. You will see yourself in its pages, and you will be reminded of the almighty power of the Lamb among the stars. Certainly a most incredible feat of writing (it took me around fifteen hours to read!) - I look forward to getting hold of the next installment. Much more is yet to come for the people of Farholme.

Author site
Author blog


Be sure and check out the posts by these other bloggers:

Brandon Barr Jim Black Justin Boyer Jackie Castle Carol Bruce Collett Valerie Comer CSFF Blog Tour Gene Curtis D. G. D. Davidson Chris Deanne Janey DeMeo Jeff Draper April Erwin Marcus Goodyear Rebecca Grabill Jill Hart Katie Hart Michael Heald Timothy Hicks Christopher Hopper Heather R. Hunt Jason Joyner Kait Carol Keen Mike Lynch Margaret Rachel Marks Shannon McNear Melissa Meeks Rebecca LuElla Miller Mirtika or Mir's Here Pamela Morrisson Eve Nielsen John W. Otte John Ottinger Deena Peterson Rachelle Steve Rice Ashley Rutherford Chawna Schroeder James Somers Rachelle Sperling Donna Swanson Steve Trower Speculative Faith Robert Treskillard Jason Waguespac Laura Williams Timothy Wise

GOLDENEYES by Delia Latham

This is my first taste of Delia's writing, and I must say I’m intrigued by her intricately woven work. Come back in time to 1936 to glimpse a mysterious scenario, then jump to 1959 and watch the consequences of that night in the lives of several families.

Juliana is offered a long-coveted job writing for a Christian magazine, and the boss first mistakes her for his lookalike cousin before trying to resist strong feelings. Gillian cares for her weak mother, who aches to reveal a long-hidden secret. Daniel, Gillian’s childhood friend, sets out to seek God and makes some surprising discoveries, and Juliana’s parents set about telling her the real truth of what happened all those years ago.

What if you had relatives you never knew about? What if a drunkard’s remorse could finally lead to astonishing revelations for his children? What if twins can feel each others’ pain, and what if God sends an angel that looks more like a tramp? One by one, the dots are joined, slowly, carefully, until the picture is complete. I think you’ll like what you see when you step back to take a look.

It’s a wonderfully convoluted double-triple romance peopled with a great many preachers, writers, dreamers, and mothers. Old diaries, a golden ring, a mysterious traveller with golden eyes, and many unexpected twists make this story highly enjoyable - a very clever piece of sweet inspirational romance with a delightfully satisfying conclusion.

Nor Iron Bars a Cage - by Caprice Hokstad

I've been on an epic journey...and it cost me a good few sleepless nights. I'm usually not this keen on fantasy, but this time the author drew me in so strongly that I couldn't put the book down. It is a long book, and a deep read - one of those stories that takes you into another world and keeps you there until you turn the last page. And that lasted five days (or rather, nights) for me.

The curtains open at the point where the last episode ended. Having also read "The Duke's Handmaid" some time ago, I enjoyed the benefits of some familiarity with the world of Latoph and Byntar - customs of slavery and royalty, colourful peculiarities of language and grammar. In this second volume, we get to know the characters better - most of them were also in Book One, but now it goes deeper and we get a long look at their reactions under pressure of all kinds. Yes, there is cruelty, but the folks we're rooting for consistently deal with it in an honourable manner despite their suffering.

Duke Vahn's freewill slave Keedrina, known here by her slave-name "kee", undertakes a dangerous mission to recover the duke's young son, held captive in the dangerous neighbouring realm of Ganluc. This story, involving the cage in the title, takes up most of the first half of the book, but that is by no means all you will discover. During kee's absence, the duke himself accepts a hasty challenge and must deal with the unpleasant consequences, providing an insightful view of his behaviour in what is certainly a humiliating experience for him.

The storyline is at least as unusual as the title, and you can't tell from the back cover where it's going to end up. It's chock full of cliffhangers and climaxes, and also challenges for the characters we have come to love. They must endure a series of highly unusual and uncomfortable situations, which most accomplish with uncommon grace. In fact, kee is almost too good to be true, but it's clear she is motivated by her great love for the duke.

At first glance, things may seem very black and white. The good guys are exemplary in personality and behaviour, while the bad guys (and girls) are completely bound by their self-centred thinking. However, on reading further, the human weaknesses of heroes and heroines are also visible, and likewise a measure of true understanding on the part of their enemies. Of course, I mean "human" in the broader sense, since in Byntar the people are Elva and Itzi. Interactions between these complementary breeds make a fascinating level of dynamics within the tale.

The reason I don't usually go for fantasy is that most of it is set in a world largely resembling medieval Europe, and that can get predictable after a while. But here, that is not the case at all. Sure, there are similarities, and the level of technology is comparable with our own Middle Ages. Yet in every line we are made aware that these events are taking place on a different planet, and the action is upheld by two non-human species living under double suns and moons.

There's a delicious rhythm in the telling. You can tell that the writer has studied her craft and knows what she's doing. This lady can WRITE. Each word is deliberate yet gentle, painstakingly carved out, a fragile thing of beauty indeed. The language is emotive and evocative, colourful and contoured, warm and tangible. I doff my hat to Caprice, in wonder at her authorly diligence while keeping up a household and homeschooling all those kids, too. That's what I call a hardworking mom.

You'll enjoy the breadth of situations in these pages, and the thorough exploration of deep questions and wonderings. How would a royal person deal with slavery and cruelty? It made me remember how the King of Heaven came down to earth to live as a lowly man. There is no word of reference to God or Christianity, but you will find richly-woven themes of sacrifice and humility, love and friendship, good versus evil, and the final victory of justice and hope, like a fairytale for grown-ups. Go ahead and dive into the intensity of this experience - take the journey, and come back changed.

Read a FREE excerpt (first 3 chapters)
http://members.aol.com/cfvici/latoph/NIBAC.html

The most economical place to buy Nor Iron Bars a Cage:
http://www.lulu.com/caprice



The official author/book website:
www.Latoph.com

Various profile sites:
http://www.shoutlife.com/capricehokstad
http://www.myspace.com/cfvici
http://caprice.renspace.com

And don't forget to check out other reviews at http://cfrblog.blogspot.com/ and the author's blog at http://cfvici.blogspot.com/ :)

CSFF Tour: Auralia's Colors

Featured book: Auralia’s Colors

Book web site

Featured author: Jeffrey Overstreet
Author blog: Looking Closer Journal

Participants’ Links: Brandon Barr Jim Black Justin Boyer Grace Bridges Jackie Castle Carol Bruce Collett Valerie Comer CSFF Blog Tour D. G. D. Davidson Chris Deanne Jeff Draper April Erwin Marcus Goodyear Andrea Graham Jill Hart Katie Hart Timothy Hicks Heather R. Hunt Becca Johnson Jason Joyner Kait Karen Carol Keen Mike Lynch Margaret Rachel Marks Shannon McNear Melissa Meeks Rebecca LuElla Miller Mirtika or Mir's Here Pamela Morrisson Eve Nielsen John W. Otte John Ottinger Deena Peterson Rachelle Steve Rice Cheryl Russel Ashley Rutherford Hanna Sandvig Chawna Schroeder James Somers Rachelle Sperling Donna Swanson Steve Trower Speculative Faith Jason Waguespac Laura Williams Timothy Wise