tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-246726372024-03-17T23:42:29.708-06:00Christy's Book Blogfaith, family, & fictionChristy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.comBlogger1353125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-49712164144438915632013-07-28T20:00:00.000-06:002013-07-28T20:00:16.460-06:00Jesus wept...and a whole lot more<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">When talking about Jesus’ time here
on earth, we tend to think about him as a god in human skin, something similar
to how Zeus and Apollo were said to have roamed the earth. They were immortal
with all of their powers and abilities but <i>looked</i>
human. When we do this with Jesus, we forget that he truly was mortal, with more
humanness that you’ve imagined!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">Jesus wasn’t just pretending to be
human so that he could fit in with us. He was human, yes so he could sacrifice
himself for our sins, but also so that we can relate to him today. It’s
difficult to connect to an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent invisible being
in the sky, and God knows that. That’s why Jesus had to become like us, so that
we can know that there is nothing we face that he didn’t face as well.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">As a boy, he surely fell and skinned
his knee, probably bumped his head many times, and tracked mud on Mary’s
freshly swept floor. When Jesus worked as a carpenter with Joseph, he got
splinters, cut his fingers, smashed his thumb with a hammer, and got his hands
filthy with stain and glue. As an adult in his ministry, Jesus walked miles, on
a near daily basis, in sandals on a dusty road. When the woman washed his feet
with her hair and perfume in Matthew 26: 5-7, she wasn’t washing freshly
cleaned feet that just came out of socks and shoes with neatly trimmed
toenails. I’m betting they were blistered, callused, dirty, and smelly. Jesus
also had to deal with all of the normal human illnesses. He hiccupped, burped,
and sneezed. He may have gotten acne as a teenager and certainly had the
occasional stomach bug. In the winter, he was cold, and his nose ran. In the
summer, he was hot and sweaty. 1<sup>st</sup> century Jerusalem wasn’t known
for its terrific hygiene: Jesus didn’t use deodorant or brush his teeth.
Standing for hours while teaching and then walking for miles, he had aches and
pains in his joints and back. He was a real human being with everything that
entails! <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">I was camping this week, probably not
the best choice of dates. We set up our tent on Wednesday, Thursday afternoon
we had to frantically take it down under a severe thunderstorm warning that had
threat of tornado, and we were never able to put it up again in two days straightof
torrential rain. So Jesse and I ended up sharing the camper with my mom,
stepdad, brother, and Mia. As I lay in bed listening to snoring in three
different octaves, I found myself wondering if Jesus ever went through this.
And you know what: He did! He didn’t have a camper to rest in every night as he
walked through Judea, Samaria, and the surrounding countryside. He most
certainly was caught in a rainstorm, and with twelve disciples plus seventy
other male followers, I am positive that Jesus lay awake nights listening to
much wider variety snoring than I was blessed with. But there’s another part to
camping: campfires. The best part of camping is sitting around the campfire at the
end of the day, (although Jesus probably didn’t have s’mores). The best
conversation always seems to happen around the campfire, as the flames soften
faces, and the dark crowds around, everyone leans in a little closer, listens a
little harder, speaks more from the heart. I’ve always imagined Jesus speaking
to his disciples in the daytime, but now I can’t help but wonder if his most
powerful talks with them happened around a campfire, explaining his parables,
foretelling of his death in Jerusalem, talking about the Father. His words from
John 8: 12, </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“I am</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> the light of the world.</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> Whoever
follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.</span><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">” takes on a whole new meaning around
a campfire.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">I don’t say these things about Jesus
to take away his glory. Not even a little. I want you to think about what he
sacrificed for us in giving up his divinity to come down here on earth. In
Heaven, Jesus never felt physical pain, illness, or discomfort. He gave up perfection,
never suffering or struggling, to experience life on earth as one of his beloved
children who are never perfect, always suffering and struggling. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">In movies, when someone dies, they
often argue with God or St Peter or an angel about wanting to come back to
earth, but that’s ridiculous. When I die and am removed from my body, I am never
again going to want to feel daily pain, get the flu, or scratch a mosquito
bite! The spiritual body the Lord will give us in death will have none of the
little aches and pains of having a physical body, yet Jesus relinquished that
to live with and love us. His sacrifice on earth isn’t <i>just</i> about his sacrifice on the cross; it’s also about his
sacrifice in giving up perfection in Heaven!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">Another thing we tend to romanticize
about Jesus is his appearance. Look at the depictions of him in art throughout history:
he’s always white, perfectly groomed, his clothing neat and clean, and most of
all, admit it: he’s handsome! Even in The Passion of the Christ, a good-looking
actor was hired to play him, and in the most recent mini-series The Bible,
Twitter was trending #sexyJesus because the actor playing him was apparently
“sexy”. But the Bible specifically says otherwise. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">Isaiah 53:2 says: <span class="text"><i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">He
had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,</span></i></span><i> <span class="text"><span style="background: white;">nothing in his appearance</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background: white;"> </span></span><span class="text"><span style="background: white;">that we should desire him</span></span></i></span><span class="text"><i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 200%;">.</span></i></span><span class="text"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 200%;"> </span></span><span class="text"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 200%;">I like how The Message Bible
states it best: <i>There was nothing
attractive about him,</i></span></span><i><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span class="text"><span style="background: white;">nothing to cause us to take a second look.</span></span>
<span class="text"><span style="background: white;">He was looked down on and
passed over,</span></span> <span class="text"><span style="background: white;">a
man who suffered, who knew pain firsthand.</span></span> <span class="text"><span style="background: white;">One look at him and people turned away.</span></span> <span class="text"><span style="background: white;">We looked down on him, thought he was
scum. </span></span></span></i><i><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">That’s pretty clear that Jesus was
not a handsome or attractive man, and <i>that</i>
was part of God’s plan. He didn’t want people following Jesus because of his
appearance. It was Jesus’ message that attracted (and repelled) people to
Jesus. It’s easy to follow a leader who is attractive, consider many
politicians today; we often care more about how they look than what they say.
Jesus was the antithesis of this. He was not a handsome man, because he was far
more concerned with winning our hearts than our eyes. Think again at the
pictures of Jesus: I don’t think that he spent time daily grooming his beard
and mustache; he only had three years to do and say everything that needed to
be done to prepare his disciples for his death and resurrection! <i>That</i> was his priority!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">I know that this subject matter may
make some uncomfortable, and others may refuse to hear it at all, but when we
deny Jesus’ humanity, we lessen his purpose on earth. Because of his
experiences as a human, he’s felt what we feel; he’s faced the challenges we’ve
faced; he knows what life on earth as a human is like, and we can turn to him
for comfort, security, and forgiveness knowing that Jesus really gets it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">Jesus came to earth to be one of us
so that when we cry, tears of joy or pain, we can look at him and know that he
knows just how it feels. Jesus was a big brother to at least six other children:
brothers Jude, Joseph, James, and Simon and at least two sisters. As the eldest
child in his family, he knows what it’s like to hold a newborn baby in his arms
and feel completely overwhelmed with love. On the other hand, he also changed
dirty diapers and wiped runny noses. He
grew up in a large family that was surely filled with love and affection. He
knows the private jokes that siblings have with each other, and the way they
can make each other crazy as no one else on earth can! Joseph, Jesus’ earthly
father, died before Jesus began his ministry, so Jesus knows the grief and loss
that comes with the death of a parent. He loved his mother, Mary; you can see
it in his interactions with her in John 2:1 in the wedding at Cana, putting her
off and then doing her bidding anyway, as well as on the cross in ensuring that
the disciple John would care for her after his death. You can also see his love
for Mary in his compassion in Luke 7 for the widow of Nain whose son he brought
back from the dead; in the widow’s grief he could foresee his own mother’s pain
at his death. Jesus got angry: throwing
over the tables of the moneychangers in the Temple wasn’t an act of gentleness
in John 2. He was bullied: In Luke 4 his hometown of Nazareth laughed at his
claim to be Messiah and attempted to throw him off a cliff, and the Pharisees
were constantly trying to trap him and make him look foolish. Jesus was wounded
by his family in Matthew 12: the same brothers he grew up with now thought he
was insane and came to bring him home away from his ministry. Jesus became
frustrated: In Matthew 17, when the disciples failed to free a boy of demonic
possession, Jesus lashed out saying, “how long shall I put up with you?” In
John 11, He cried over a friend’s death, weeping at Lazarus’ grave. Jesus was afraid: read his prayer in
Gethsemane in Matthew 14 and you can feel both his terrible fear and terrific
courage. He had his heart broken: Judas,
one of his closest friends, betrayed him with a kiss. Jesus was abandoned: the
disciples deserted him after his arrest. And Jesus felt forsaken. In Matthew
27, at the end on the cross, he cried out, “My God, my God! Why have you
forsaken me?” Jesus encountered joy and
laughter, love and fear, heartbreak and personal pain, just like us, and he willingly
did it all so that we can turn to him and say, “I know you know my pain, Jesus,
be my best friend. Love me for who I am. Heal my heart’s brokenness and fill me
up with your Spirit.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 200%;">How amazing and awesome is Jesus’
love for us that he would give up an eternal life in Heaven free of any
hardship or pain for a temporal one here on earth that would end in his death
on a cross? Because he met all of the challenges we have to meet, he is able to
say to us with truth, “Yes, it will be okay. Maybe not now, but I promise,
someday it <i>will </i>be okay again.” His
sacrifice is one that we can relate to every single day: when we get a blister
on our feet or a splinter in our finger; when we love our mother or have a
friend betray us; when we lose someone we love or feel forsaken by God;
wherever we are, whatever we face, Jesus has been there. And he did it out of
love for each and every one of us.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-40859050765250484302013-02-05T19:20:00.000-06:002013-02-05T19:20:08.525-06:00Very different reviews<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I have been finding more joy in my reading again, so I want to share a couple of reviews from my most recent reads. Enjoy!</span><br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0QTswVSJZHg/URGvgfszyNI/AAAAAAAADV8/uMxVmZonzIA/s1600/god.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0QTswVSJZHg/URGvgfszyNI/AAAAAAAADV8/uMxVmZonzIA/s1600/god.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Your-God-Too-Small-Believers/dp/0743255097/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1360113333&sr=1-1&keywords=your+god+is+too+small">Your God is Too Small</a> by J.B. Phillips has been sitting on my shelf for at least two years, and now that I have finished reading it, I'm kicking myself for not picking it up sooner! This classic discussion of Christian thought packs a lot of punch in the 124 pages. The writing is very intellectual and doesn't play down to the reader. It's certainly not a Max Lucado style title with folksy charm and a vocabulary anyone can pick up and enjoy, but the dense text is well worth the effort. I don't know that it would change anyone's mind who doesn't already believe in God, but for me, it helped me to think more deeply about why I believe the way I do while also challenged me to go deeper in my relationship with the Lord. I highlighted passages every night while reading it, and it's a book I know I will read again and again as I grow in my faith. It's the type of book I want to tell everyone to pick up and then form a book club for discussion!</span><br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-YxEYonHM7P0/URGvgvRT8eI/AAAAAAAADWA/lqHWBO5BWcA/s1600/horses.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-YxEYonHM7P0/URGvgvRT8eI/AAAAAAAADWA/lqHWBO5BWcA/s1600/horses.jpg" /></a><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Half-Broke-Horses-True-Life-Novel/dp/1416586296/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1360113430&sr=1-1&keywords=half+broke+horses">Half Broke Horses</a> by Jeannette Walls is the follow-up book to her powerful memoir The Glass Castle where she shared her story of growing up with her artistic and unstable mother Rosemary Smith Walls. This novel is based on the life of Rosemary's mother, Lily Casey Smith, who began breaking horses with her father at the age of five, rode 500 miles on her horse at the age of fifteen to start teaching school, and never let any of life's heartaches bring her down for long. Walls does a beautiful job of creating Lily's strong and original voice as she relays her life in a matter-of-fact manner that still sometimes feels like a tall tale. The beginning of the book is a bit disjointed as each story is contained in 2-3 pages, and each new chapter tells another story not necessarily in chronological order, but once Lily gets going, the book moves along at a steady clip jumping from her bigamous marriage in Chicago to her sister's suicide to her marriage to Big Jim and their life together running a gas station, a ranch, and later a small town isolated in the Arizona mountains. Along the way, Lily gives birth to Rosemary and Little Jim, both she raises seemingly without tenderness or tolerance for tears. She determines early on in Rosemary's life that she will never tell her daughter that she is beautiful, so the girl doesn't rely on her looks as Lily's younger sister, Helen did. Jeannette writes in such a way as to allow the reader to see the impact of Lily's child-raising techniques on Rosemary without Lily seeming to notice them herself, a neat trick. Lily is a powerful and colorful character (taking out her dentures often in restaurants to show them to the waitress because she is so proud of their beauty) that she seems like someone the reader would love to take a meal with (perhaps not at a restaurant), because she never runs out of things to say, has an opinion on everything, and lived a life of adventure, but not someone you'd want to actually be raised by, especially seeing how Rosemary turned out. Lily tried to use her life experiences to teach her children about life, but some lessons can't be taught. Near the end of the book, Lily confronts her daughter about her boyfriend, Rex Walls, (Jeannette's father), asking Rosemary if she didn't learn anything at all from her mother. Rosemary's response is telling, "When you thought you were teaching me one thing, I was busy learning something else." Readers familiar with The Glass Castle will see just how polar Rosemary's parenting is to Lily's and how Lily's refusal to show softness to her daughter had devastating effects on Jeannette and her siblings. The title comes from what Lily's father called horses that were born wild, caught by cowboys for rounding up cattle and tamed only enough to do the job before being released back into the wild. They weren't tame enough to be good for work, but had lost the wild impulses that allowed them to live free and were good for nothing after; readers can see similarities between the titular horses and Lily, her father, and Rosemary, all a little bit lost in the world but doing their best to get by. Thoroughly enjoyable, the book is an excellent read, whether you have read The Glass Castle or not, and captures the voice of a woman who lived a fascinating life and lived to inspire a granddaughter to want something better for her own.</span></span><br />
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Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-48110583076308383792012-11-09T14:06:00.000-06:002012-11-09T14:06:33.902-06:00Placebo<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zfWoCPQqrWE/UJ1iBP6iiwI/AAAAAAAADVY/iBsS9d4FGC0/s1600/placebo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zfWoCPQqrWE/UJ1iBP6iiwI/AAAAAAAADVY/iBsS9d4FGC0/s1600/placebo.jpg" /></a><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0800734254/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img">Placebo</a> by <a href="http://stevenjames.net/">Steven James</a> is the first book in his new Jevin Banks' Experience series. Jevin was a successful escape artist until his wife inexplicably drove her van into a lake, drowning herself and their twin sons. Haunted by their deaths and blaming himself for not being able to rescue them, Jevin has started a new career using his magician's skills to expose psychics and paranormal experts using the tricks he knows all too well. His latest job is to expose the fakery of a quantum physicist, Dr. Tambryn, who is claiming to be able to prove a form of telepathy between people who have a close relationship. His trusted team of Charlene, his "lovely assistant" and Xavier, his tech guy with a taste for conspiracy theories, travel with him to Tambryn's clinic, but their plans are suddenly changed when an assassin tries to murder the doctor, which exposes a link between the clinic and a pharmaceutical firm. Jevin's determination to find the truth could lead him all the way to the White House and question all that he knows to be true. James has become one of my favorite authors with his Patrick Bowers series, and while I was initially disappointed that this book wasn't in that series, Jevin quickly won me over with his broken heart and desire to save everyone around him and make up for those he couldn't save. James grounds the story in scientific fact, making the wild theories inside seem all too possible, and while Jevin's skill set wouldn't seem that powerful, his clever mind makes him a smart action hero. His team, Charlene, Xavier, and Fionna (the technical queen who with her homeschooled children can break into any computer) add both humor and heart to the story and keep Jevin grounded. Placebo will have you wondering just how much James has made up and what is true, and the political machinations will have ramifications far into the series. I can't wait to read the next book in the series!<br />
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Thank you to Revell Books for providing me with a copy of this book for review.<br />
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Available in November from Revell, a division of the Baker Publishing Group at your favorite bookseller. </div>
Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-68016648210917456042012-10-30T13:01:00.001-06:002012-10-30T13:01:05.891-06:00Beyond the Storm<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center>
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<a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center>
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<span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center>
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<span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1426745974">Beyond the Storm</a></span></center>
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Abingdon Press (October 2012)
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by</center>
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<span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.carolynzane.net/">Carolyn Zane</a></span></center>
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b>
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Author of 35 books, wife, mother and yes…hot (flasher) lives with her fabulous husband, Matt and their 5 children and 3 dogs in the scenic Willamette Valley in Oregon. When asked to describe her family, Carolyn likens her crowd to the
Brangelia Bunch saying modestly, “Only we’re better looking.” Right now,Carolyn is back in the saddle with her new title: <i>Beyond The Storm</i>, coming out in October 2012! In the mean time, be sure to catch her on the critically acclaimed TOOHOTMAMAS Blog where Carolyn and Wendy tackle Marriage, motherhood and menopause: How to do all three and stay out of prison! They are hilarious! You'll wet yourself, guaranteed! Visit them at: <a href="http://www.toohotmamas.wordpress.com/">www.toohotmamas.wordpress.com</a>.
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b> <br />
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After a tornado rips through her town, store owner Abigail comes across a piece of fabric from a wedding dress among the devastation. Abigail is moved to start collecting other swatches of fabric she finds – her neighbor’s kitchen curtains, a man’s necktie, a dog’s bed – which she stashes in shopping bags. As she pursues her seemingly absurd quest, horrible realities spark the question, “What kind of a God would allow such tragedy?”
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As she struggles to reconcile her right to happiness amidst the destruction, Abigail begins piecing together a patchwork quilt from the salvaged fabric in hopes it will bring some peace. But a new relationship with Justin, a contractor, may require too much of her fragile heart. Will her pain and questions of faith give way to the courage to love?
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1426745974">Beyond the Storm</a>, go <a href="http://www.blogger.com/Beyond%20the%20Storm">HERE</a>.
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Today marks the end of Christy's Book Blog as it has been for the last 7-1/2 years. No one's life remains the same for that period of time, and mine has changed since the inception of my blog. During this time, I have made so many friends and read wonderful books I may never have picked up without the opportunity to blog them. But I don't have the time to read like I used to; in 2010 I read 445 books, in 2011 I read 250. This year I have yet to break 100. I know that's still more than many others, but for me, it makes it so that I want to make sure that the books I read are ones I truly love and want to share hours with. I spent some time today looking through a list of the books I've read during this time, and there were some I wish I hadn't wasted my time on, some I love dearly years after putting them down, but the majority I can't remember a single thing about them. I want to read only memorable books. I may still share my reviews with you here, but there won't be any more blog tours (except for the rare one I signed up for prior to this and need to fulfill my obligation to). Thank you so much everyone for visiting me here, reading my reviews, and maybe even reading some of my recommendations. I apologize for being mostly absent for the last several months. I hope that our time here together has blessed you somehow.<br />
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God bless,<br />
Christy</div>
Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-90327609345975811752012-09-14T14:55:00.002-06:002012-09-14T14:55:31.198-06:00The Bridesmaid<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center>
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<a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center>
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<span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center>
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<span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209787">The Bridesmaid</a></span></center>
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Bethany House Publishers (September 11, 2012)</center>
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by</center>
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<span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.beverlylewis.com/">Beverly Lewis</a></span></center>
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b><br />
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Beverly's first venture into adult fiction is the best-selling trilogy, The Heritage of Lancaster County, including The Shunning, a suspenseful saga of Katie Lapp, a young Amish woman drawn to the modern world by secrets from her past. The book is loosely based on the author's maternal grandmother, Ada Ranck Buchwalter, who left her Old Order Mennonite upbringing to marry a Bible College student. One Amish-country newspaper claimed Beverly's work to be "a primer on Lancaster County folklore" and offers "an insider's view of Amish life."<br />
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Booksellers across the country, and around the world, have spread the word of Beverly's tender tales of Plain country life. A clerk in a Virginia bookstore wrote, "Beverly's books have a compelling freshness and spark. You just don't run across writing like that every day. I hope she'll keep writing stories about the Plain people for a long, long time."<br />
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A member of the National League of American Pen Women, as well as a Distinguished Alumnus of Evangel University, Lewis has written over 80 books for children, youth, and adults, many of them award-winning. She and her husband, David, make their home in Colorado, where they enjoy hiking, biking, and spending time with their family. They are also avid musicians and fiction "book worms." <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b><br />
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The Latest in Chart-Topping Amish Fiction from Beverly Lewis<br />
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Twenty-seven-year-old Joanna Kurtz has made several trips to the altar, but never as a bride. The single young Amishwoman is a closet writer with a longing to be published something practically unheard of in her Lancaster County community. Yet Joanna's stories aren't her only secret. She also has a beau who is courting her from afar, unbeknownst even to her sister, Cora, who, though younger, seems to have suitors to spare. <br />
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Eben Troyer is a responsible young Amishman who hopes to make Joanna Kurtz his bride--if he can ever leave his parents' farm in Shipshewana, Indiana. Yet with his only brother off in the English world, intent on a military career, Eben's hopes for building a life with his dear Joanna are dimming, and patience is wearing thin. Will Joanna ever be more than a bridesmaid?<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209787">The Bridesmaid</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-bridesmaid.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209787">The Bridesmaid</a> by <a href="http://beverlylewis.com/">Beverly Lewis</a> is the second book in the Home to Hickory Hollow series about a quiet Amish community in Pennsylvania. Joanna Kurtz was introduced in the first book, The Fiddler, as an imaginative and sweet Amish woman. In this book, she becomes more fully rounded as a woman well past the age most Amish women are married, and friends and family are starting to consider her a <i>Maidel</i>, old maid. Joanna has always sought refuge in her secret writings, stories that she writes in journals, never intending to share them with others, mindful of the Amish ban on seeking publicity or praise. When she meets Eben Troyer from Shipshewana, Indiana at a family get-together in Virginia Beach, the two have an immediate connection that grows quickly into a long distance relationship through letters and clandestine phone calls. But Eben didn't tell her that his ability to move to Hickory Hollow is dependent on his brother Leroy's returning to the Plain life. Have you ever read a story and found the characters bled over into your real life? I'm embarrassed to admit this, but last night when I went to bed (in the middle of the book) I caught myself asking the Lord to help Joanna and Eben's relationship. That's truly a sign of a good novel, where the characters are compelling and the story poignant. Some readers may become frustrated with Joanna and Eben's passivity, but their trust in the Lord is a powerful message to the story. I didn't like the character of Joanna's younger sister, Cora Jane; she seemed to vindictive and judgmental that when she has a change of heart, it didn't seem realistic because it was too radical. I truly liked Joanna and Eben and felt that some of the other plotlines: the quilt, Cora Jane, and Leroy, distracted from their story at times. I also wish that Amelia, the main character from the first novel, had made an appearance, but I still enjoyed the book and will definitely pick up the next book in the series. </div>
Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-54369475929371162952012-09-13T21:07:00.000-06:002012-09-13T21:07:02.479-06:00A Fistful of Collars<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1451665164/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img">A Fistful of Collars</a> by <a href="http://chetthedog.com/">Spencer Quinn</a> is the fifth book in the Chet & Bernie mystery series about Chet the dog and his owner Bernie Little, a private detective. Bernie and Chet are hired by the mayor's office to keep an eye on movie star, Thad Perry, whose new movie is shooting in town and good for business, but he has a reputation for trouble. Bernie's curiosity makes him check into Thad's past which sends the pair on one of most intricate cases of their career. The case gets even more complicated when Bernie's son, Charlie, is hired as an extra for the film and actually shows a bit of talent. Bernie and Chet are quite a team, but it's Chet's narration that has made it one of my favorite series. Quinn must be part dog (that's a compliment!) because Chet feels incredibly real with his extraordinary love for Bernie and Charlie, his short attention span, and his normal doggy behavior: eating the food under car seats, acting out when family tension rises, and getting easily distracted whenever something more interesting catches his attention. Quinn changes things up a bit in this novel; Chet never gets separated from Bernie (which would eventually get old), Bernie and Susie are re-evaluating their relationship, and Bernie is forced to question his trust in an old friend and colleague. This book could easily slip into being too cutesy or a one-trick pony (I would love to hear Chet's explanation for that phrase), but Quinn adds real drama and tension. Bernie's world is a occasionally a dark one, but Chet's narration keeps it from turning too cruel, and he often humanizes the tragedy. It's going to be a long wait for another whole year til Chet & Bernie's next adventure.<br />
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Thank you to Atria Books for providing me with a copy of this book for review!</div>
Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-75177036027108255702012-09-12T10:43:00.000-06:002012-09-12T10:43:05.237-06:00Found<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center>
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<a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center>
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<span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062089757">Found</a></span></center>
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Avon Inspire; Original edition (September 4, 2012)</center>
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<span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://shelleyshepardgray.com/">Shelley Shepard Gray</a></span></center>
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cty0HdIgt_0/TsXi2N04a_I/AAAAAAAAEIM/6yxxmGZbf4w/s1600/Shelley.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cty0HdIgt_0/TsXi2N04a_I/AAAAAAAAEIM/6yxxmGZbf4w/s200/Shelley.jpg" width="160" /></a></div>
Since 2000, Shelley Sabga has sold over thirty novels to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Harlequin, Abingdon Press, and Avon Inspire. She has been interviewed by NPR, and her books have been highlighted in numerous publications, including USA Today and The Wall Street Journal.<br />
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Under the name Shelley Shepard Gray, Shelley writes Amish romances for HarperCollins’ inspirational line, Avon Inspire. Her recent novel, <i>The Protector</i>, the final book in her “Families of Honor” series, hit the New York Times List, and her previous novel in the same series, <i>The Survivor</i>, appeared on the USA Today bestseller list. Shelley has won the prestigious Holt Medallion for her books, <i>Forgiven</i> and <i>Grace</i>, and her novels have been chosen as Alternate Selections for the Doubleday/Literary Guild Book Club. Her first novel with Avon Inspire, Hidden, was an Inspirational Reader’s Choice finalist.<br />
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Before writing romances, Shelley lived in Texas and Colorado, where she taught school and earned both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education. She now lives in southern Ohio and writes full time. Shelley is married, the mother of two children in college, and is an active member of her church. She serves on committees, volunteers in the church office, and currently leads a Bible study group, and she looks forward to the opportunity to continue to write novels that showcase her Christian ideals.<br />
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When she’s not writing, Shelley often attends conferences and reader retreats in order to give workshops and publicize her work. She’s attended RWA’s national conference six times, the ACFW conference and Romantic Times Magazine’s annual conference as well as traveled to New Jersey, Birmingham, and Tennessee to attend local conferences.<br />
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Check out Shelley's <a href="http://www.facebook.com/#%21/pages/Shelley-Shepard-Gray/154203285072">Facebook Fan page</a> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b> <br />
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A murder is solved and a quiet Amish community must deal with the repercussions. Amid the surprising revelations, can a newfound love survive?<br />
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As the search for Perry Borntrager's killer continues, Jacob Schrock feels like his world is about to crumble. Right before Perry went missing, he and Jacob got into a fistfight. Jacob never told anyone what happened that terrible night. He's good at keeping secrets—including his love for Deborah, Perry's sister. But when Deborah takes a job at his family's store and their friendship blossoms, Jacob senses everything is about to be revealed. <br />
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Deborah has been searching for a slice of happiness ever since her brother's body was discovered. When the police start questioning Jacob, Deborah can't believe that the one person she's finally allowed in could be the one responsible for her brother's death. Will she believe what everyone seems to think is the truth . . . or listen to her heart, and hope there is still one more person who is keeping secrets in Crittenden County?<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter excerpt of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062089757">Found</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/09/found-excerpt.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062089757"> Found</a> by <a href="http://shelleyshepardgray.com/">Shelley Shepard Gray</a> is the final book in the Secrets of Crittenden County series about how the murder of Perry Borntrager shakes up his Amish community. While the police believe they are close to finding his killer, Perry's former best friend, Jacob Schrock has much to regret and hide about his final meeting with Perry. Deborah, Perry's younger sister, is finally starting to break out from her parents' shell and find a life of her own, which includes working at Schrocks' Variety Store. She's had a crush on Jacob since she was a little girl who followed Perry and Jacob everywhere, but since Perry stole from the store and turned to drugs, Jacob has treated her as though she were the villain. But Jacob is finally starting to see Deborah as her own person instead of as an extension of the Borntrager family, and he can see just what a beautiful woman she has become, but as details of Perry's last day on earth emerge, it tests the couple's newfound attraction. Gray, as always, has created a town filled with people who feel very real and readers would love to visit or even move to! Deborah is the central character in this book, and she's a real standout. Just finding her way and strength, I wish Gray would continue with her story because she's a rare find. There are few flaws in the book: Jacob apologizes to Deborah her first day working at the store, and she is touched by his change of heart, yet the next time they meet things are just as tense; and after Luke interviews Jacob about the murder, he is certain of Jacob's guilt, yet just a page later he believes his story. In the end, Gray has done a great job of portraying a community's reaction to the murder of a son and how it will impact them all in the years to come. She was more interested in focusing on that than on the gory details of death or the intricacies of a police investigation, and the story is powerful because of her focus on the people. </div>
Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-89561490012649470922012-08-16T19:26:00.000-06:002012-08-16T19:26:09.114-06:00The Choice<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hI9vIyth6Qc/UC2dCmxe3nI/AAAAAAAADTY/22_Yubm8Lac/s1600/images.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hI9vIyth6Qc/UC2dCmxe3nI/AAAAAAAADTY/22_Yubm8Lac/s1600/images.jpg" /></a><a href="http://ow.ly/cJsiD">The Choice</a> by <a href="http://robertwhitlow.com/">Robert Whitlow</a> is a powerful story of the consequences a single choice can make, the how it sends ripples down through the years through lives we couldn't begin to imagine. Sandy Lincoln is the most popular girl in her high school in 1974 Rutland, Georgia: cheerleader, straight A student, dating the football star. She had everything going for her until she allows him to persuade her to go farther than she knew she should and that one experience leaves her pregnant and her world shattered. The football star tries to force her into abortion, and even her father agrees it may be the best option, but Sandy's mother and aunt want her to consider adoption, in order not to punish a child innocent of any wrong. Sandy decides to put her child up for adoption, but on the way to move in with her aunt, she meets a strange woman who tells her that she is pregnant with twin boys, and she must be very careful in what she decides to do with them. Sandy is deeply disturbed and shaken by the woman's words, and that shapes her actions in the months and years to come, and then again thirty-three years later when she meets them under circumstances no one would even dream. I was a teenage mother in high school, and Whitlow does a great job of portraying the ostracism and shame associated with it. Sandy is a likable protagonist, and the reader is quickly pulled into her story and comes to care about her deeply. The story is compelling and well-written. I started and finished it in one evening, because I just couldn't put it down. In fact, as I noticed I was beginning to run out of pages, I tried to read more slowly, in order to remain with these characters for as long as I could. I do think that the threads were all tied up just a bit too neatly. The rest of the story seems like real life, and life doesn't work like that. But that's a very small flaw in a terrific book.<br />
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Thank you to LitFuse for providing me with a copy of this book for review. Please take a look at other reviews of the book here: <a href="http://litfusegroup.com/blogtours/13527503/robertwhitlow"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: white;">http://litfusegroup.com/</span></span>blogtours/13527503/robertwhitlow</a><br />
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<b>Enter Today - 8/7-8/27!</b><br />
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</b><a href="http://litfusegroup.com/blogtours/13527503/robertwhitlow"> <img alt="Robert Whitlow The Choice Nook Color Giveaway" height="150" src="http://g.virbcdn.com/_f/cdn_images/resize_1024x1365/9e/ContentImage-20-76737-TheChoicegiveaway300.png" width="170" /> </a></div>
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Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-1551635239701550002012-07-27T17:50:00.005-06:002012-07-27T17:50:51.986-06:00The Kingdom<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1433525208">The Kingdom</a></span></center> <center>Crossway Books (June 30, 2012)</center> <center>by</center> <center><span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.chiveis.com/">Brian M. Litfin</a></span></center> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b><br />
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Bryan earned a bachelor’s degree in print journalism from the University of Tennessee as well as a master’s degree in historical theology at Dallas Theological Seminary. From there he went to the University of Virginia, taking a PhD in the field of ancient church history. He is currently professor of theology at Moody Bible Institute in downtown Chicago, where he has been since 2002. He teaches courses in theology, church history, and Western civilization from the ancient and medieval periods. He is the author of Getting to Know the Church Fathers: An Evangelical Introduction (Brazos, 2007), as well as several scholarly articles and essays. Bryan has always enjoyed epic adventure stories as well as historical fiction, but most of his reading these days is taken up by academia.<br />
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Today Bryan lives in downtown Wheaton in a Victorian house built in 1887. He and his wife Carolyn are parents to two children. For recreation Bryan enjoys basketball, traveling, and hiking anywhere there are mountains. The Litfins attend College Church in Wheaton, where Bryan has served on the Board of Missions and as a deacon. He also helped start Clapham School, a Christian primary school in Wheaton using the classical model of education. <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b><br />
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<b>Book Three in the Chiveis Trilogy</b><br />
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War and disease have destroyed the modern world. Centuries later, feudal societies have arisen across Europe. No one can remember the ancient religion of Christianity—until an army captain and a farmer’s daughter discover the Sacred Writing of the one true God.<br />
As Teo and Ana encounter the forgotten words of the holy book, they realize its message is just what their kingdom needs. Though exiled from their homeland, they join their hearts in a quest to return. But now an ancient pact has united the enemies of the Christian faith into a dark alliance that threatens to consume the known world. Racing to stay one step ahead of their enemies, Teo and Ana must battle heinous villains, stormy seas, and the powers of the underworld itself. As armies begin to mass for a final battle, the odds favor the forces of evil. Can Teo and Ana bring divine truth to Chiveis—or will the Word of God fade from the earth forever?<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1433525208">The Kingdom</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-kingdom.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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I absolutely adore this series, but haven't finished reading this book yet. I'll post the review as soon as I have!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-62609714908254094562012-07-25T20:48:00.000-06:002012-07-25T20:48:16.728-06:00Wedded to War<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802405762">Wedded to War</a></span></center> <center>• River North; New Edition edition (July 1, 2012)<br />
</center> <center>by</center> <center><span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.jocelyngreen.com/">Jocelyn Green</a></span></center> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b> <br />
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Jocelyn Green is a child of God, wife and mom living in Cedar Falls, Iowa. She is also an award-winning journalist, author, editor and blogger. Though she has written nonfiction on a variety of topics, her name is most widely recognized for her ministry to military wives: Faith Deployed. Her passion for the military family was fueled by her own experience as a military wife, and by the dozens of interviews she has conducted with members of the military for her articles and books, Faith Deployed: Daily Encouragement for Military Wives and its sequel, Faith Deployed...Again: More Daily Encouragement for Military Wives. She is also co-author of both Stories of Faith and Courage from the War in Iraq & Afghanistan and Stories of Faith and Courage from the Home Front (forthcoming, May 2012). Her Faith Deployed Web site and Facebook page continue to provide ongoing support, encouragement and resources for military wives worldwide.<br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b><br />
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<b>When war erupted, she gave up a life of privilege for a life of significance.</b> <br />
Tending to the army's sick and wounded meant leading a life her mother does not understand and giving up a handsome and approved suitor. Yet Charlotte chooses a life of service over privilege, just as her childhood friend had done when he became a military doctor. She soon discovers that she's combatting more than just the rebellion by becoming a nurse. Will the two men who love her simply stand by and watch as she fights her own battles? Or will their desire for her wage war on her desire to serve God?<br />
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Wedded to War is a work of fiction, but the story is inspired by the true life of Civil War nurse Georgeanna Woolsey. Woolsey's letters and journals, written over 150 years ago, offer a thorough look of what pioneering nurses endured. This is the first in the series "Heroines Behind the Lines: Civil War," a collection of novels that highlights the crucial contributions made by women during times of war.<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802405762">Wedded to War</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/07/wedded-to-war.html">HERE</a>.
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I haven't quite finished this powerful novel yet, and will post my review as soon as I do!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-42444225052733338342012-07-08T21:17:00.000-06:002012-07-08T21:17:50.181-06:00The Gifted<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I apologize for the lateness of this posting. It was due last week, but my laptop crashed, and I had to borrow my mom's in order to get this up. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I will be back online again soon!<br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0800734556/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img">The Gifted</a> by <a href="http://anngabhart.com/">Ann Gabhart</a> is the fifth book in her popular Shaker series about the unusual religious group of the 19th century. Jessamine Brady is a true innocent in the world. The first half of her of life was spent living with her granny, isolated in the woods and listening to the old woman's fairy tales and stories about the Lord. The last half of her life has been spent among the Shakers. When Jessamine was just ten, her granny died, leaving her alone in the world, so she was taken in by the community. She loves working with her hands and worshiping the Lord, but poor Jessamine has never been able to completely follow all of the rules as set forth by the Shakers. She has stories and songs that fill her heart, but are forbidden as sinful, and she has a deep curiousity about the outside world, especially on this one day, parasols, which leads her deeper and deeper into the woods, hoping to encounter White Oak Springs, a fashionable spa where the ladies are known to carry them. Instead of seeing a parasol, Jessamine finds a man who appears to have fallen off of his horse after being shot at. He claims to have no memory of who he is, and Jessamine can't quite seem to keep her hand from touching his face and enjoying the feel of the stubble on his face. Tristan Cooper did indeed lose his memory at first and thought he had been discovered by an angel. Later when his memory returns, he decides to keep that knowledge hidden while he recovers in the Shaker community in order to find out just who would be shooting at him and why. Tristan and Jessamine can't seem to stop thinking about each other, so she is soon in trouble with the elders for breaking too many rules, and he is sent on his way back to the world. Gabhart is terrific at recreating the mysterious world and religion of the Shakers, and she manages to do so without being overly negative about some of their stranger practices. Jessamine is such an innocent that everyone (including readers) who meet her can't help but be drawn to her sweet nature and love of life. Tristan is more of a cipher, despite Gabhart's attempts, I couldn't quite get a grasp of just who he was, and I felt the same way about Sheldon Brady. Because I couldn't relate to either of them, this book didn't have the power for me of previous books in this series. Something was missing just a bit in this volume, so it isn't up the five star status of the other books, but it's still a fascinating read. <br />
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Available July 2011 from Revell, a division of the Baker Publishing Group at your favorite bookseller.<br />
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Thank you to Revell for providing me with a copy of this book for review!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-13012192936058609832012-07-02T18:05:00.001-06:002012-07-02T18:05:10.741-06:00Nothing to Hide<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/200764206397">Nothing to Hide</a></span></center> <center>Bethany House Publishers (July 1, 2012)<br />
</center> <center>by</center> <center><span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.jmarkbertrand.com/">J. Mark Bertrand</a></span></center> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b> <br />
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J. Mark Bertrand lived in Houston, where the series is set, for fifteen years,<br />
earning an MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Houston. But after<br />
one hurricane too many he left for South Dakota. Mark has been arrested<br />
for a crime he didn't commit, was the foreman of one hung jury and served<br />
on another that acquitted Vinnie Jones of assault. In 1972, he won an<br />
honorable mention in a child modeling contest, but pursued writing instead. <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b><br />
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<b>A grisly homicide. An international threat.<br />
The stakes have never been higher for<br />
Detective Roland March.</b><br />
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The victim's head is missing, but what intrigues Detective Roland March<br />
is the hand. The pointing finger must be a clue--but to what? According<br />
to the FBI, the dead man was an undercover asset tracking the flow of<br />
illegal arms to the Mexican cartels. To protect the operation, they want<br />
March to play along with the cover story. With a little digging, though, he<br />
discovers the Feds are lying. And they're not the only ones.<br />
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In an upside-down world of paranoia and conspiracy, March finds himself<br />
dogged by injury and haunted by a tragic failure. Forced to take justice into<br />
his own hands, his twisting investigation leads him into the very heart of<br />
darkness, leaving March with nothing to lose--and nothing to hide.<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/%200764206397">Nothing to Hide</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/07/nothing-to-hide.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/200764206397">Nothing to Hide</a> by <a href="http://jmarkbertrand.com/">J. Mark Bertrand</a> is the third book in the outstanding Roland March murder mystery series. When Roland is called to investigate the murder of a man who was decapitated and de-gloved as a way of keeping his identity secret, at first he considers the involvement of the Mexican cartels. With Houston's proximity to the border, his guess wouldn't be too big of a stretch, but what he uncovers instead is a shocking mix of political machinations, secret agents and double agents, and a connection to his past Roland thought was long buried. Bertrand's writing is hard-edged police procedural mixed with the inner workings of a man tortured by his desire to right wrongs, even at great personal cost. The story is complicated, fast-paced, action-packed, and always, <i>always</i> intelligent. By the time Roland begins to uncover the truth, the reader can barely keep track of who is betraying who and just who the real bad guy is, and when the murderer is revealed, I was just as shocked as Roland. Bertrand excels at keeping me guessing (and as a frequent murder mystery reader, it's hard to surprise me). Some police procedural series go on far past their expiration date, but with Bertrand writing, I will always keep coming back to see what he's put March up against next.</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-70063479004180298002012-06-28T21:54:00.001-06:002012-06-28T21:54:11.548-06:00Five Miles South of Peculiar<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-NAtzCXBAD-o/T-0myOs-NII/AAAAAAAADS8/8EQ4eC1HgIc/s1600/angela.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-NAtzCXBAD-o/T-0myOs-NII/AAAAAAAADS8/8EQ4eC1HgIc/s320/angela.jpg" width="208" /></a><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1439182043/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img">Five Miles South of Peculiar</a> by <a href="http://angelahuntbooks.com/">Angela Hunt</a> is a poignant yet joyful novel of a Southern family finding its way home. The Caldwells of Peculiar, Florida have always lived in their estate The Sycamores, but in 2018, exactly fifty years after the death of the family founder, all of the property will pass into the hands of the city. Despite this looming deadline, Darlene and Nolie Caldwell continue living life at The Sycamores as it's been lived for the past fifty years, without thought of social networking or computers. Nolie spends her time sewing beautiful aprons and dreams of the day when she'll meet a good man to help ease the wounds of a past love. Darlene is a force of nature within Peculiar, running most of the town's groups, while almost having a relationship with the mayor. When Darlene's twin sister Carlene returns home from a successful life on Broadway (and hiding a secret), Darlene is at first thrilled to unite with her other half, but the twins were in love with the same man, who became Darlene's husband, and that wound is still tender and deep in them both. The three women are all looking for something, but they each need to heal the pain between them before they can find it. Hunt has created another powerful novel filled with people you not only want to know, but feel like you've met. This story may not have a time-traveling serial killer or vampires falling in love with ghosts; instead it has heart and a deep understanding of people. Hunt doesn't have to use flashy storylines to create a novel that is impossible to put down. The story of the Caldwell sisters will stay with me, because of Hunt's ability to craft such fully fleshed characters. I love the author's work, and this novel will certainly gain her some new fans.<br />
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Thank you to Glass Road Publicity for providing me with a copy of this book for review. </div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-65999814187336980442012-06-26T13:09:00.002-06:002012-06-26T13:09:46.764-06:00The Search<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062089722">The Search</a></span></center> <center> Avon Inspire; Original edition (June 19, 2012)</center> <center>by</center> <center><span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://shelleyshepardgray.com/">Shelley Shepard Gray</a></span></center> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b><br />
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Since 2000, Shelley Sabga has sold over thirty novels to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Harlequin, Abingdon Press, and Avon Inspire. She has been interviewed by NPR, and her books have been highlighted in numerous publications, including USA Today and The Wall Street Journal.<br />
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Under the name Shelley Shepard Gray, Shelley writes Amish romances for HarperCollins’ inspirational line, Avon Inspire. Her recent novel, <i>The Protector</i>, the final book in her “Families of Honor” series, hit the New York Times List, and her previous novel in the same series, <i>The Survivor</i>, appeared on the USA Today bestseller list. Shelley has won the prestigious Holt Medallion for her books, <i>Forgiven</i> and <i>Grace</i>, and her novels have been chosen as Alternate Selections for the Doubleday/Literary Guild Book Club. Her first novel with Avon Inspire, Hidden, was an Inspirational Reader’s Choice finalist.<br />
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Before writing romances, Shelley lived in Texas and Colorado, where she taught school and earned both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education. She now lives in southern Ohio and writes full time. Shelley is married, the mother of two children in college, and is an active member of her church. She serves on committees, volunteers in the church office, and currently leads a Bible study group, and she looks forward to the opportunity to continue to write novels that showcase her Christian ideals.<br />
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When she’s not writing, Shelley often attends conferences and reader retreats in order to give workshops and publicize her work. She’s attended RWA’s national conference six times, the ACFW conference and Romantic Times Magazine’s annual conference as well as traveled to New Jersey, Birmingham, and Tennessee to attend local conferences.<br />
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Check out Shelley's <a href="http://www.facebook.com/#%21/pages/Shelley-Shepard-Gray/154203285072">Facebook Fan page</a> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b> <br />
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In the second book in her Secrets of Crittenden County series, New York Times bestselling author Shelley Shepard Gray delivers another page-turning romance set in Amish country<br />
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The serenity of the quiet Amish community of Crittenden, Kentucky is disrupted when Abby Anderson discovers the body of Perry Borntrager in an abandoned well. Perry had been missing for months. Everyone figured he had left the order during his rumspringa. As friends and family reel from this news, and are faced with the first death by mysterious circumstance to occur in their small town in over 20 years, a homicide detective arrives to help solve the crime<br />
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Before Perry disappeared, Frannie Eicher and Perry had been secretly courting. Now that it’s common knowledge that he was murdered, it’s up to Fannie to decide whether or not to tell everyone about the secrets he told her. <br />
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After much deliberation, she decides to tell Luke Reynolds, the visiting police officer, what she knows. At first, the two meet only on the context of discussing Perry’s death. Then, Luke begins to feel more and more at home, both with Frannie, and in Marion. The only problem is that he feels a romantic pull toward Frannie. Frannie feels that same attraction toward Luke, but is afraid to give her heart to him. After all, she doesn’t want to leave her faith. <br />
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As Luke uncovers more secrets about Perry and the case draws out, his time in Marion runs out. He has to decide whether to go back to his job with the Cincinnati Police Department…or stay in Marion.<br />
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If you would like to read the Prologue of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062089722">The Search</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/06/search.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062089722">The Search</a> by <a href="http://shelleyshepardgray.com/">Shelley Shepard Gray</a> is the second book in The Secrets of Crittenden County series. The discovery of Perry Borntrager's body has stirred up this close-knit Amish community. Detective Luke Reynolds is still trying to sort through the evidence and learn the identity of the killer, but his feelings for Perry's former flame Frannie Eicher has put a crimp in his investigation. When she is injured in a kitchen accident, Luke finds himself spending more time at her hospital bedside than working on the case, and ignoring the possibility that Frannie may be hiding something from him about it. Frannie's accident forces Beth Byler to take over Frannie's bed and Breakfast, which is far out of her comfort zone. She's more comfortable taking care of babies and young children than baking and being a good hostess, but mysterious guest Chris Ellis not only helps out but awakens something inside Beth. Others in the community are struggling with the repercussions of Perry's drug dealing and death as well, especially his sister Deborah who knows far more than she's telling anyone. Gray has a real talent for creating fascinating stories with Amish characters, exposing them as real people with hopes, dreams, and secrets. Frannie is the center of this novel, and she's a terrific heroine: strong, smart, and wanting desperately to be loved. I think that Beth and Chris' relationship was a bit rushed; they both confess to extraordinarily deep feelings that seem unrealistic based on the three encounters in the story. That's the only flaw in this story filled with suspense, major twists and turns, romance, and friendship. Gray makes it very easy to fall in love with the Amish communities she describes, and I'm ready to book my stay at the Yellow Bird Inn in Crittenden County!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-40940369061736520982012-06-08T13:48:00.001-06:002012-06-08T13:48:55.274-06:00Son of the Underground<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0857211994/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img">Son of the Underground</a> by Isaac Liu is about the son of the famous Heavenly Man, Brother Yun, who has a story of his own to tell. Isaac's father was in prison for preaching God's Word when Isaac was born. In fact his birth was just the first of many miracles in this young man's life. Growing up in Communist China, he faced persecution and disgust from his peers and people from his village because of his father's record as an "enemy of the people" for being a firm follower of Jesus Christ. Yun missed much of his son's life, on the run and in prison, but his influence was felt in his son when Isaac began teaching people about God's Word at a very young age. He has seen the staunch faith of his grandmother, Nai Nai, who raised him when he was very young, and his mother who never gave up on or turned on her husband or God. In this book, Isaac tells the story of his youth in China, flight to Burma and then on to Germany to escape persecution for his faith and his father's "crimes." The book is fascinating in its tale of life in Communist China as a Christian, and each of us should be very grateful for the freedoms we have. It's also the very personal story of one man's search for a faith and calling of his own, separate from the father who has shadowed much of his life. The book is compelling and inspiring, but the narrative jumps around chronologically at times. jumping from age ten to eleven and down to eight or nine within a few pages. Isaac's writing style is also a bit stiff (which probably comes from his not being as familiar with English), so the deeply emotional parts don't have the impact they should. It's a good read for anyone wanting to know more about the Heavenly Man and his family, or looking for the story of one man's faith in impossible circumstances.<br />
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Thank you to Kregel Publishing for providing me with a copy of this book for review! </div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-478508684555150462012-06-06T19:54:00.002-06:002012-06-06T19:54:38.297-06:00A Harvest of Rubies<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802405584">Harvest of Rubies</a></span></center> <center>River North; New Edition edition (May 1, 2012)</center> <center>by</center> <center><span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.tessaafshar.com/">Tessa Afshar</a></span></center> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b> <br />
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TESSA AFSHAR was voted "New Author of the Year" by the Family Fiction sponsored Reader's Choice Award 2011 for her novel Pearl in the Sand. She was born in Iran, and lived there for the first fourteen years of her life. She moved to England where she survived boarding school for girls and fell in love with Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte, before moving to the United States permanently. Her conversion to Christianity in her twenties changed the course of her life forever. Tessa holds an MDiv from Yale University where she served as co-chair of the Evangelical Fellowship at the Divinity School. She has spent the last thirteen years in full-time Christian work.<br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b> <br />
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<b>Remarkable Talent Threatens to Cloud a Life</b><br />
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The prophet Nehemiah’s cousin can speak several languages, keep complex accounts, write on tablets of clay, and solve mysteries. Her accomplishments catapult her into the center of the Persian court – working long hours, rubbing elbows with royalty, and becoming the queen’s favorite scribe.<br />
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Not bad for a woman living in a man’s world: so why does Sarah feel like a failure?<br />
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A devastating past has left Sarah with two conclusions: that God does not love her, and that her achievements are the measure of her worth – a measure she can never quite live up to.<br />
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Darius Pasargadae is accustomed to having his way. A wealthy and admired aristocrat, the last thing he expects is a wife who scorns him.<br />
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Can two such different people help one another overcome the idols that bind them?<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802405584">Harvest of Rubies</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/06/harvest-of-rubies.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802405584">A Harvest of Rubies</a> by <a href="http://tessaafshar.com/">Tessa Afshar</a> is the first in a series of biblical fiction in the time of the Jewish exile in Babylon. Sarah discovered a way into her scribe father's heart by teaching herself to read Persian, and the quicker she learned, the more praise and attention she earned from him. When her cousin, Nehemiah, cup-bearer to the king, helps her earn a place at Persepolis, the palace, as the queen's scribe, she is at first terrified of such a rapid ascent. She loves her position in the palace, working with numbers and proving her worth through hard work, even though she constantly pushes herself harder and harder, fearful of losing her place and other's respect for her. When she solves a politically dangerous mystery for Queen Damaspia, the queen in turns does a "good" deed for Sarah by finding her a royal groom, Darius. Sarah's fear of marriage and complete lack of knowledge of all things feminine lead her to make a terrible mistake, shaming her husband and earning his disgust. He deposits her at his estate and leaves to stay at court, and Sarah, for the first time in her life, is forced to be herself without hiding behind work and numbers, and must do her best to hide her love for her husband. I had high expectations for this novel, but Afshar blew them all away. Sarah is so full of self-hatred, the reader can't help but ache for her and hope for Darius to see his real wife. Afshar carefully creates this very lifelike world that just springs to life under her capable pen. She includes mystery, romance, faith, and drama all into one powerful and thoroughly enjoyable novel. I was stunned when I came to the end of the book, nowhere near ready to say goodbye to the characters, so I am thrilled to know that a sequel is in the works!<br />
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<br /></div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-78280047744350156162012-05-25T11:41:00.001-06:002012-05-25T11:41:30.704-06:00Praying with the Grain<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jxmHLDvD6J0/T7_EJFRbe6I/AAAAAAAADRI/-ae2ejk5_0k/s1600/grain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jxmHLDvD6J0/T7_EJFRbe6I/AAAAAAAADRI/-ae2ejk5_0k/s1600/grain.jpg" /></a><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0857211528/ref=cm_cr_thx_view">Praying with the Grain</a> by Pablo Martinez is a book to revolutionize your prayer life by helping you analyze your personal style and then encouraging you to pray, without guilt or procrastination. Martinez writes like a professorial uncle, very intelligent yet sympathetic and without judgment. The book opens with a comparison of personalities: introvert vs extrovert and then expands into four categories: thinking/feeling and sensation/intuitive. He breaks down how each psychological function impacts our prayer life, and I was stunned at how accurate his insights were. His breakdown of how a thinking person prays made me wonder if he had been secretly watching me pray, he had every aspect correct, down to the tiniest detail. Once Martinez is done helping readers figure out what category they fall into, he gets into the nitty-gritty of prayer: difficulties in prayer, types of prayer, and the importance of prayer. I was fascinated by Martinez' insights and inspired to change the way I've been praying to better fit my personality (and to please God). The book is truly intelligent and an enjoyable read, and has truly changed my life.<br />
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Thank you to Kregel Publications for providing me with a copy of this book for review!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-37627724858105405502012-05-19T10:43:00.003-06:002012-05-19T10:43:51.027-06:00Hiking Through<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-m1vNuWodL8w/T7fNkUfTKNI/AAAAAAAADPw/w5gkIBtYiEc/s1600/hiking.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-m1vNuWodL8w/T7fNkUfTKNI/AAAAAAAADPw/w5gkIBtYiEc/s1600/hiking.jpg" /></a><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Hiking-Through-Journey-Freedom-Appalachian/dp/0800720539/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1337445580&sr=1-1">Hiking Through</a> by <a href="http://hikingthrough.com/">Paul Stutzman</a> is the story of one man's journey on the Appalachian trail, through grief, and to understanding about God. Stutzman spent his life working at a restaurant to make enough money for he and his wife to enjoy when he retired. Unfortunately, his wife, Mary, died of breast cancer, and he was left along and struggling with guilt, grief, and depression. He decided to fulfill a life-long dream of hiking the entire Appalachian trail, all 2,176 miles and fourteen states as a way to find God and to spread his message to husbands to cherish their families and take time to enjoy them. God hijacked Stutzman's journey and gave him a very different message, one that the author shares with readers about hope and trusting in God. I've always had a fascination with the Appalachian trail, and as my illness keeps me from ever fulfilling it, I enjoy reading about others' experiences on it. Stutzman's writing is part travelogue, part journal, part devotional. He does a great job of allowing readers to see through his eyes the beauty he witnessed in God's creation: the storms, the butterflies, the majestic mountaintops. He doesn't just stop to smell the flowers; he tastes them! Stutzman shares many stories about small miracles on the trail, strange coincidences that have God's fingerprints all over them, and he encourages readers to seek out God on their own journey and see what He has to tell them. One of the most powerful messages Stutzman has for readers is that of trusting God in the midst of grief. Here's my own coincidence: I signed up for this blog tour months ago, never knowing that I would need to read a book on grief. But last week Saturday, my dog Cooper was hit and killed by a car. I would never consider weighing the loss of a dog with that of a spouse, but my grief and pain is very real, and I've been struggling all week with the question of "Why, God? Why?" Toward the end of the book, Stutzman stops writing about the trail and for a few paragraphs addresses this very question in such a way that I couldn't help but sob, and then began to feel some peace. He's a great plainspoken writer with a gift for detail and self-deprecation that keeps readers hooked for mile after mile. God gave Stutzman a mission on that trail, and he fulfills it well with this book. I hope he decides to take another journey someday and take the rest of us along with his again.<br />
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Thank you to Revell Books for providing me with a copy of this book for review! Available May 2012 from Revell Books a division of the Baker Publishing Group at your favorite bookseller. </div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-91035640572321673472012-05-17T18:10:00.002-06:002012-05-17T18:10:46.404-06:00Chameleon<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1616384964">Chameleon</a></span></center> <center>Realms (May 15, 2012)</center> <center>by</center> <center><span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.jilliankent.com/">Jillian Kent</a></span></center> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b><br />
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Jillian Kent is a busy writer and the alter ego of Jill Nutter, a full-time counselor.<br />
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Jill spent the first semester of her senior year of college at Oxford studying British Literature, where she fell in love with England. During this season, she came to appreciate the written word, the rich imagery of romantic poetry like The Highwayman, and historical novels of many types, including Jane Austen and all things Regency.<br />
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Jill received her Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from Bethany College in West Virginia, and her Masters Degree in Social Work from WVU, and she brings her fascination with different cultures and societies into her writing.<br />
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Jill has always been a romantic at heart, so readers will find a good dose of romance woven through each of her novels. Jill, her husband Randy, and children Katie and Meghan are animal lovers. They currently own two dogs, Boo-Boo and Bandit and a menagerie of cats, Lucky, Yuma, Snow, and Holden. Critters of all assortments make their appearance in her stories. <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b><br />
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How much can you really know about someone?<br />
Lady Victoria Grayson has always considered herself a keen observer of human behavior. After battling a chronic childhood illness that kept her homebound for years, she journeys to London determined to have the adventure of a lifetime.<br />
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Jaded by his wartime profession as a spy, Lord Witt understands, more than most, that everyone is not always who they pretend to be. He meets Victoria after the Regent requests an investigation into the activities of her physician brother, Lord Ravensmoore.<br />
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Witt and Victoria become increasingly entangled in a plot targeting the lords of Parliament. Victoria is forced to question how well she knows those close to her while challenging Witt’s cynical nature and doubts about God. Together they must confront their pasts in order to solve a mystery that could devastate their future.<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1616384964">Chameleon</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/05/chameleon.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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I didn't finish reading this yet so I'll post my review as soon as I do!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-40788285083486843552012-05-16T20:06:00.001-06:002012-05-16T20:06:19.691-06:00My Stubborn Heart<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209744">My Stubborn Heart</a></span></center> <center>• Bethany House Publishers; Original edition (May 1, 2012)<br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b><br />
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Becky Wade is a graduate of Baylor University. As a newlywed, she lived for three years in a home overlooking the turquoise waters of the Caribbean, as well as in Australia, before returning to the States. A mom of three young children, Becky and her family now live in Dallas, Texas.<br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b><br />
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A Sensational CBA Debut in Contemporary Romance! <br />
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This summer author Becky Wade makes her CBA debut with a fun -- and funny -- contemporary romance. Amidst the light-hearted banter and laugh-out-loud moments is a compelling spiritual journey of one woman's choice to listen to God and wait on him. Filled with humor and authentic romance, My Stubborn Heart is shaping up to be the hit of the summer.<br />
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Kate Donovan is burned out on work, worn down by her dating relationships, and in need of an adventure. When Kate's grandmother asks Kate to accompany her to Redbud, Pennsylvania, to restore the grand old house she grew up in, Kate jumps at the chance.<br />
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Yet, she discovers a different kind of project upon meeting the man hired to renovate the house. ;Matt Jarreau is attractive and clearly wounded -- hiding from people, from God, and from his past. Kate can't help but set her stubborn heart on bringing him out of the dark and back into the light... whether he likes it or not.<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209744">My Stubborn Heart</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/05/my-stubborn-heart.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209744">My Stubborn Heart</a> by <a href="http://beckywade.com/">Becky Wade</a> is a debut sure to thrill the hearts of Christian romance fans. Kate Donovan has been waiting thirty-one years for the man of her dreams. She's kissed a few frogs, and is trying to hold tightly to the knowledge that God has good in mind for her; she just hopes that part of the good is a husband. After losing her heart for her job as a social worker, she jumps at the chance to renovate the family home of Chapel Bluff in Redbud, Pennsylvania with her quirky grandmother. Matt Jarreau has known more than his share of heartache in his life, and it has caused him to retreat from the world, from his career, family, and friends to work as a small town contractor. His life has been reduced to work, eating alone and watching television to keep him from ever having to hurt or feel again. Kate is immediately drawn to the pain she sees in Matt's eyes, and despite his best intentions, he can't seem to keep away from the charming redhead. Wade has written a romance populated by thoroughly compelling and enjoyable characters. Kate's loving nature makes her reach out to Matt again and again when most would retreat, and when he intentionally pulls away from her, her education allows her to help the reader understand just how deeply hurt he is, making him even more sympathetic. What really makes the book sing is Wade's ability to climb into her characters' heads. When Kate and Matt touch for the first time, Kate's thoughts rush and tumble in her head, and Wade manages to portray that intoxicating fear and joy. She does just as well with Matt who comes across as a real man, not the watered down romanticized version in most romances. Matt's pain and his desire for Kate are very real and almost dangerous at times. His feelings are visceral and the reader can't help but fall in love with this couple and they gently find their way toward each other. I absolutely can't wait until Wade's next book releases; she is definitely a writer to watch!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-32376071614965537832012-05-01T19:29:00.000-06:002012-05-01T19:29:01.618-06:00Garden of Madness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_cESuxv-WNX8/TA3PbPpKjHI/AAAAAAAAEFE/e9Dq6nSnpCA/s1600/FIRSTWildCardTours2.jpg"></a><a href="http://firstwildcardtours.blogspot.com/"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480264388542368882" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_cESuxv-WNX8/TA3PbPpKjHI/AAAAAAAAEFE/e9Dq6nSnpCA/s200/FIRSTWildCardTours2.jpg" style="cursor: hand; cursor: pointer; float: left; height: 200px; margin: 0 10px 10px 0; width: 145px;" /></a>It is time for a <span style="color: #990000;"><strong><a href="http://firstwildcardtours.blogspot.com/">FIRST Wild Card Tour</a></strong></span> book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! <span style="color: #990000;"><strong>Enjoy your free peek into the book!</strong></span>
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<span style="color: #cc0000;"><em>You never know when I might play a wild card on you!</em></span>
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<strong>Today's Wild Card author is: </strong>
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<strong><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 180%;"><a href="http://www.tracyhigley.com/">Tracy L. Higley</a></span></strong>
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<strong><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 180%;"><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 100%;">and the book:</span> </span></strong>
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<strong><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 180%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/140168680X">Garden of Madness</a></span></strong>
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<span style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">Thomas Nelson; 1 edition (May 1, 2012)</span>
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***Special thanks to Ruthie Dean of Thomas Nelson for sending me a review copy.***<br />
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<strong><span style="color: #333399; font-size: 130%;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></span></strong></div>
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Tracy started her first novel at the age of eight and has been hooked on writing ever since. After earning a B.A. in English Literature at Rowan University, she spent ten years writing drama presentations for church ministry before beginning to write fiction. A lifelong interest in history and mythology has led Tracy to extensive research into ancient Greece, Egypt, Rome and Persia, and shaped her desire to shine the light of the gospel into the cultures of the past.<br />
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She has traveled through Greece, Turkey, Egypt, Israel, Jordan and Italy, researching her novels and falling into adventures.<br />
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Visit the author's <a href="http://www.tracyhigley.com/">website</a>.
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<strong><span style="color: #333399; font-size: 130%;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">SHORT BOOK DESCRIPTION:</span> </span></strong></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-F-hk0qye2IM/T5yzHlBHlDI/AAAAAAAAIFg/XjOIwPpYis8/s1600/GardenMadness.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-F-hk0qye2IM/T5yzHlBHlDI/AAAAAAAAIFg/XjOIwPpYis8/s200/GardenMadness.jpg" width="131" /></a>The Untold Story of King Nebuchadnezzar's Daughter.<br />
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For seven years the Babylonian princess Tiamat has waited for the mad king Nebuchadnezzar to return to his family and to his kingdom. Driven from his throne to live as a beast, he prowls his luxurious Hanging Gardens, secreted away from the world.<br />
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Since her treaty marriage at a young age, Tia has lived an opulent but oppressive life in the palace. But her husband has since died and she relishes her newfound independence. When a nobleman is found murdered in the palace, Tia must discover who is responsible for the macabre death, even if her own is freedom threatened.<br />
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As the queen plans to wed Tia to yet another prince, the powerful mage Shadir plots to expose the family's secret and set his own man on the throne. Tia enlists the help of a reluctant Jewish captive, her late husband's brother Pedaiah, who challenges her notions of the gods even as he opens her heart to both truth and love.<br />
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Product Details:<br />
List Price: $9.99<br />
Paperback: 400 pages<br />
Publisher: Thomas Nelson; 1 edition (May 1, 2012)<br />
Language: English<br />
ISBN-10: 140168680X<br />
ISBN-13: 978-1401686802<br />
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<span style="color: #cc0000;"><strong><span style="font-size: large;">AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:</span> </strong>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-weight: bold;">Prologue</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-weight: bold;">Babylon, 570 BC</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">My name is Nebuchadnezzar. Let the nations hear it!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">I am ruler of Babylon, greatest empire on earth. Here in its capital city, I am like a god.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tonight, as the sun falls to its death in the western desert, I walk along the balconies I have built, overlooking the city I have built, and know there is none like me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">I inhale the twilight air and catch the scent of a dozen sacrifices. Across the city, the smoke and flames lift from Etemenanki, the House of the Platform of Heaven and Earth. The priests sacrifice tonight in honor of Tiamat, for tomorrow she will be wed. Though I have questioned the wisdom of a marriage with the captive Judaeans, tomorrow will not be a day for questions. It will be a day of celebration, such as befits a princess.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tiamat comes to me now on the balcony, those dark eyes wide with entreaty. “Please, Father.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">I encircle her shoulders in a warm embrace and turn her to the city.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“There, Tia. There is our glorious Babylon. Do you not wish to serve her?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She leans her head against my chest, her voice thick. “Yes, of course. But I do not wish to marry.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">I pat her shoulder, kiss the top of her head. My sweet Tia. Who would have foretold that she would become such a part me?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“Have no fear, dear one. Nothing shall change. Husband or not, I shall always love you. Always protect you.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She clutches me, a desperate grip around my waist.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">I release her arms and look into her eyes. “Go now. Your mother will be searching for you. Tomorrow will be a grand day, for you are the daughter of the greatest king Babylon has ever seen.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">I use my thumb to rub a tear from her eye, give her a gentle push, and she is gone with a last look of grief that breaks my heart.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">The greatest king Babylon has ever seen.</span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;"> The words echo like raindrops plunking on stones. I try to ignore a tickling at the back of my thoughts. Something Belteshazzar told me, many months ago. A dream.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">I shake my head, willing my mind to be free of the memory. My longtime Jewish advisor, part of my kingdom since we were both youths, often troubles me with his advice. I keep him close because he has become a friend. I keep him close because he is too often right.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">But I do not want to think of Belteshazzar. Tonight is for me alone. For my pleasure, as I gaze across all that I have built, all that I have accomplished. This great Babylon, this royal residence with its Gardens to rival those created by the gods. Built by my mighty power. For the glory of my majesty. I grip the balcony wall, inhale the smoky sweetness again, and smile. It is good.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">I hear a voice and think perhaps Belteshazzar has found me after all, for the words sound like something he would say, and yet the voice . . . The voice is of another.</span></div>
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“There is a decree gone out for you, Nebuchadnezzar. Your kingship has been stripped from you.”</div>
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I turn to the traitorous words, but no one is there. And yet the voice continues, rumbling in my own chest, echoing in my head.</div>
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“You will be driven from men to dwell with beasts. You will eat the herbs of oxen and seven times will pass over you, until you know that the Most High is ruler in the kingdom of men. To whom He wills power, He gives power.” </div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The tickling is there again, in my mind. I roll my shoulders to ease the discomfort, but it grows. It grows to a scratching, a clawing at the inside of my head, until I fear I shall bleed within.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The fear swells in me and I am frantic now. I rub my eyes, swat my ears, and still the scratching and scraping goes on, digging away at my memories, at my sense of self, of who I am and what I have done, and I stare at the sky above and the stones below and bend my waist and fall upon the ground where it is better, better to be on the ground, and I want only to find food, food, food. And a two-legged one comes and makes noises with her mouth and clutches at me but I understand none of it and even this knowledge that I do not understand is slipping, slipping from me as the sun slips into the desert.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">And in the darkness, I am no more.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-weight: bold;">Chapter 1</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-weight: bold;">Seven years later</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The night her husband died, Tia ran with abandon.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The city wall, wide enough for chariots to race upon its baked bricks, absorbed the slap of her bare feet and cooled her skin. She flew past the Ishtar Gate as though chased by demons, knowing the night guard in his stone tower would be watching. Leering. Tia ignored his attention.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tonight, this night, she wanted only to run.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">A lone trickle of sweat chased down her backbone. The desert chill soaked into her bones and somewhere in the vast sands beyond the city walls, a jackal shrieked over its kill. Her exhalation clouded the air and the quiet huffs of her breath kept time with her feet.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">Breathe, slap, slap, slap</span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">They would be waiting. Expecting her. A tremor disturbed her rhythm. Her tears for Shealtiel were long spent, stolen by the desert air before they fell.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Flames surged from the Tower and snagged her attention. Priests and their nightly sacrifices, promising to ensure the health of the city. For all of Babylon’s riches, the districts encircled by the double city walls smelled of poverty, disease, and hopelessness. But the palace was an oasis in a desert.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She would not run the entire three <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">bêru</span> around the city. Not tonight. Only to the Marduk Gate and back to the Southern Palace, where her mother would be glaring her displeasure at both her absence and her choice of pastime. Tia had spent long days at Shealtiel’s bedside, waiting for the end. Could her mother not wait an hour?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Too soon, the Marduk Gate loomed and Tia slowed. The guard leaned over the waist-high crenellation, thrust a torch above his head, and hailed the trespasser.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“Only Tiamat.” She panted and lifted a hand. “Running.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">He shrugged and shook his head, then turned back to his post, as though a princess running the city wall at night in the trousers of a Persian were a curiosity, nothing more. Perhaps he’d already seen her run. More likely, her reputation ran ahead of her. The night hid her flush of shame.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">But she could delay no longer. The guilt had solidified, a stone in her belly she could not ignore.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She pivoted, sucked in a deep breath, and shot forward, legs and arms pounding for home.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Home. <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">Do I still call it such?</span> When all that was precious had been taken? Married at fourteen. A widow by twenty-one. And every year a lie.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">“I shall always love you, always protect you.”</span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">He had spoken the words on the night he had been lost to her. And where was love? Where was protection? Not with Shealtiel.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The night sky deepened above her head, and a crescent moon hung crooked against the blackness. Sataran and Aya rose in the east, overlapping in false union.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“The brightest light in your lifetime’s sky,” an elderly mage had said of the merged stars. The scholar’s lessons on the workings of the cosmos interested her, and she paid attention. As a princess already married for treaty, she was fortunate to retain tutors.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Ahead, the Ishtar Gate’s blue-glazed mosaics, splashed with yellow lions, surged against the purpling sky, and to its left, the false wooded mountain built atop the palace for her mother, Amytis, equaled its height. Tia chose the east wall of the gate for a focal point and ignored the Gardens. Tonight the palace had already seen death. She needn’t also dwell on madness.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">Breathe, slap, slap, slap.</span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;"> Chest on fire, almost there.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She reached the palace’s northeast corner, where it nearly brushed the city wall, slowed to a stop, and bent at the waist. Hands braced against her knees, she sucked in cold air. Her heartbeat quieted.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">When she turned back toward the palace, she saw what her mother had done.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">A distance of one <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">kanû</span> separated the wide inner city wall from the lip of the palace roof, slightly lower. Tia kept a length of cedar wood there on the roof, a plank narrow enough to discourage most, and braced it across the chasm for her nightly runs. When she returned, she would pull it back to the roof, where anyone who might venture past the guards on the wall would not gain access. Only during her run did this plank bridge the gap, awaiting her return.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Amytis had removed it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Something like heat lightning snapped across Tia’s vision and left a bitter, metallic taste in her mouth. Her mother thought to teach her a lesson. Punish her for her manifold breaches of etiquette by forcing her to take the long way down, humiliate herself to the sentinel guard.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She would not succeed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">With a practiced eye, Tia measured the distance from the ledge to the palace roof. She would have the advantage of going from a higher to a lower level. A controlled fall, really. Nothing more.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">But she made the mistake of looking over, to the street level far below. Her senses spun and she gripped the wall.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She scrambled onto the ledge, wide enough to take the stance needed for a long jump, and bent into position, one leg extended behind. The palace rooftop garden held only a small temple in its center, lit with three torches. Nothing to break her fall, or her legs, when she hit. She counted, steadying mind and body.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The wind caught her hair, loosened during her run, and blew it across her eyes. She flicked her head to sweep it away, rocked twice on the balls of her feet, and leaped.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The night air <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">whooshed</span> against her ears, and her legs cycled through the void as though she ran on air itself. The flimsy trousers whipped against her skin, and for one exhilarating moment Tia flew like an egret wheeling above the city and knew sweet freedom.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">This was how it should always be.<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;"> My life. My choice. I alone control my destiny.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She hit the stone roof grinning like a trick monkey, and it took five running steps to capture her balance.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">Glorious</span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Across the rooftop, a whisper of white fluttered. A swish of silk and a pinched expression disappeared through the opening to the stairs. Amytis had been waiting to see her stranded on the city wall and Tia had soured her pleasure. The moment of victory faded, and Tia straightened her hair, smoothed her clothing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“Your skill is improving.” The eerie voice drifted to Tia across the dark roof and she flinched. A chill rippled through her skin.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Shadir stood at the far end of the roof wall, where the platform ended and the palace wall rose higher to support the Gardens. His attention was pinned to the stars, and a scroll lay on the ledge before him, weighted with amulets.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“You startled me, Shadir. Lurking there in the shadows.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The mage turned, slid his gaze the length of her in sharp appraisal. “It would seem I am not the only one who prefers the night.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Long ago, Shadir had been one of her father’s chief advisors. Before—before the day of which they never spoke. Since that monstrous day, he held amorphous power over court and kingdom, power that few questioned and even fewer defied. His oiled hair hung in tight curls to his shoulders and the full beard and mustache concealed too much of his face, leaving hollow eyes that seemed to follow even when he did not turn his head.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tia shifted on her feet and eyed the door. “It is cooler to run at night.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The mage held himself unnaturally still. Did he even breathe?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">As a child, Tia had believed Shadir could scan her thoughts like the night sky and read her secrets. Little relief had come with age. Another shudder ran its cold finger down her back.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tia lowered her chin, all the obeisance she would give, and escaped the rooftop. Behind her, he spoke in a tone more hiss than speech. “The night holds many dangers.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She shook off the unpleasant encounter. Better to ready herself for the unpleasantness she yet faced tonight.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Her husband’s family would have arrived by this time, but sweating like a soldier and dressed like a Persian, she was in no state to make an appearance in the death chamber. Instead, she went to her own rooms, where her two slave women, Omarsa and Gula, sat vigil as though they were the grieving widows. They both jumped when Tia entered and busied themselves with lighting more oil lamps and fetching bathwater.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">In spite of her marriage to the eldest son of the captive Judaean king, Tia’s chambers were her own. She had gone to Shealtiel when it was required, and only then. The other nights she spent here among her own possessions—silk fabrics purchased from merchants who traveled east of Babylon, copper bowls hammered smooth by city jewelers, golden statues of the gods, rare carved woods from fertile lands in the west. A room of luxury. One that Shealtiel disdained and she adored. She was born a Babylonian princess. Let him have his austerity, his righteous self-denial. It had done him little good.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">One of her women stripped her trousers, then unwound the damp sash that bound her lean upper body. Tia stood in the center of the bath chamber, its slight floor depression poked with drainage holes under her feet, and tried to be still as they doused her with tepid water and scrubbed with a scented paste of plant ash and animal fat until her skin stung.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">When they had dressed her appropriately, her ladies escorted her through the palace corridors to the chamber where her husband of nearly seven years lay cold.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Seven years since she lost herself and her father on the same day. Neither of them had met death, but all the same, they were lost. Seven years of emptiness where shelter had been, of longing instead of love.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">But much had ended today—Shealtiel’s long illness and Tia’s long imprisonment.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She paused outside the chamber door. Could she harden herself for the inevitable? The wails of women’s laments drifted under the door and wrapped around her heart, squeezing pity from her. A wave of sorrow, for the evil that took those who are loved, tightened her throat. But her grief was more for his family than herself. He had been harsh and unloving and narrow-minded, and now she was free. Tia would enter, give the family her respect, and escape to peace.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She nodded to one of her women, and Gula tapped the door twice and pushed it open.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Shealtiel’s body lay across a pallet, skin already graying. The chamber smelled of death and frankincense. Three women attended her husband—Shealtiel’s sister, his mother, and Tia’s own. His mother, Marta, sat in a chair close to the body. Her mourning clothes, donned over her large frame, were ashy and torn. She lifted her head briefly, saw that it was only Tia, and returned to her keening. Her shoulders rocked and her hands clutched at a knot of clothing, perhaps belonging to Shealtiel. His sister, Rachel, stood against the wall and gave her a shy smile, a smile that melded sorrow and admiration. She was younger than Tia by five years, still unmarried, a sweet girl.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“Good of you to join us, Tia.” Her mother’s eyes slitted and traveled the length of Tia’s robes. Tia expected some comment about her earlier dress, but Amytis held her tongue.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“I was . . . detained.” Their gazes clashed over Shealtiel’s body and Tia challenged her with a silent smile. The tension held for a moment, then Tia bent her head.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">She was exquisite, Amytis. No amount of resentment on Tia’s part could blind her to this truth. Though Amytis had made it clear that Tia’s sisters held her affections, and though Tia had long ago given up calling her <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic;">Mother</span> in her heart, she could not deny that her charms still held sway in Babylon. From old men to children, Amytis was adored. Her lustrous hair fell to her waist, still black though she was nearly fifty, and her obsidian eyes over marble cheekbones were a favorite of the city’s best sculptors. Some said Tia favored her, but if she did, the likeness did nothing to stir a motherly affection.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tia went to Shealtiel’s mother and whispered over her, “May the gods show kindness to you today, Marta. It is a difficult day for us all.” The woman’s grief broke Tia’s heart, and she placed a hand on Marta’s wide shoulder to share in it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Marta sniffed and pulled away. “Do not call upon your false gods for me, girl.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Amytis sucked in a breath, her lips taut.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tia’s jaw tightened. “He was a good man, Marta. He will be missed.” Both of these statements Tia made without falsehood. Shealtiel was the most pious man she had ever known, fully committed to following the exacting requirements of his God.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Marta seemed to soften. She reached a plump hand to pat Tia’s own, still on her shoulder. “But how could the Holy One have taken him before he saw any children born?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tia stiffened and brought her hand to her side, forcing the fingers to relax. Marta rocked and moaned on, muttering about Tia’s inhospitable womb. Tia dared not point out that perhaps her son was to blame.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“But there is still a chance.” Marta looked to Amytis, then to Tia. “It is our way. When the husband dies without an heir, his brother—”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“No.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">The single word came from both her mother’s and her own lips as one. Marta blinked and looked between them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“It is our way.” Marta glanced at Rachel against the wall, as though seeking an ally. “My second son Pedaiah is unmarried yet. Perhaps Tia could still bear a son for Shealtiel—”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“You have had your treaty marriage with Babylon.” Amytis drew herself up, accentuating her lean height. “There will not be another.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tia remained silent. Her mother and she, in agreement? Had Amytis watched her languish these seven years and regretted flinging her like day-old meat to the Judaean dogs? Did she also hope for a life with more purpose for Tia now that she had been released? Tia lifted a smile, ever hopeful that Amytis’s heart had somehow softened toward her youngest daughter.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“Jeconiah shall hear of your refusal!” Marta stood, her chin puckering.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Amytis huffed. “Take the news to your imprisoned husband, then. I shall not wait for his retribution.” She seemed to sense the unfairness of the moment and regret her calloused words. “Come, Tia. Let us leave these women to grieve.” She meant it kindly but it was yet another insult, the implication that Tia need not remain for any personal grief.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">Tia followed Amytis from the chamber into the hall, her strong perfume trailing. Amytis spun on her, and her heavy red robe whirled and settled. Her nostrils flared and she spoke through clenched teeth.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 12pt;">“By all the gods, Tiamat! For how long will you make our family a mockery?”</span></div>
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I haven't quite finished reading this title yet, and will post my review as soon as I do!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-23648024488520809822012-04-17T13:09:00.000-06:002012-04-17T13:09:08.597-06:00Stand by Me<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_cESuxv-WNX8/TA3PbPpKjHI/AAAAAAAAEFE/e9Dq6nSnpCA/s1600/FIRSTWildCardTours2.jpg"></a><a href="http://firstwildcardtours.blogspot.com/"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480264388542368882" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_cESuxv-WNX8/TA3PbPpKjHI/AAAAAAAAEFE/e9Dq6nSnpCA/s200/FIRSTWildCardTours2.jpg" style="cursor: hand; cursor: pointer; float: left; height: 200px; margin: 0 10px 10px 0; width: 145px;" /></a>It is time for a <span style="color: #990000;"><strong><a href="http://firstwildcardtours.blogspot.com/">FIRST Wild Card Tour</a></strong></span> book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! <span style="color: #990000;"><strong>Enjoy your free peek into the book!</strong></span><br />
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<span style="color: #cc0000;"><em>You never know when I might play a wild card on you!</em></span><br />
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<div align="center"><strong>Today's Wild Card author is: </strong></div><br />
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<div align="center"><strong><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 180%;"><a href="http://www.daveneta.com/">Neta Jackson</a></span></strong></div><br />
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<div align="center"><strong><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 180%;"><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 100%;">and the book:</span> </span></strong></div><br />
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<div align="center"><strong><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 180%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1595548645">Stand By Me</a></span></strong></div><div align="center"><span style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">Thomas Nelson (March 13, 2012)</span> </div><div align="center"><br />
</div>***Special thanks to Rick Roberson The B&B Media Group, for sending me a review copy.***<br />
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<div align="left"><strong><span style="color: #333399; font-size: 130%;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></span></strong></div><br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GcsvBklUcME/T3E7I3JESMI/AAAAAAAAHbI/8upMtkVt57U/s1600/Jackson,+Neta_web.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GcsvBklUcME/T3E7I3JESMI/AAAAAAAAHbI/8upMtkVt57U/s200/Jackson,+Neta_web.jpg" width="133" /></a>As a child growing up on the campus of a Christian school where her parents taught, Neta Jackson began creating imaginary worlds at a young age. Loving horses but not having one, she wrote stories about them instead. By the time she reached high school, she had so honed both imagination and writing skills that when her English teacher submitted one of her stories to a Scholastic magazine writing contest, it won first place. With that first win, Jackson knew beyond the shadow of a doubt she wanted to be a writer. She’s been writing ever since.<br />
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After marrying the love of her life, Dave Jackson, the couple chose to settle in the Chicago area where Neta had attended college. Throughout their marriage, the Jacksons have worked together as a team, writing a multitude of books together on topics ranging from medical ethics to stories of gang kids, sometimes sharing the task with other experts who have served as co-writers. Together, they have also penned forty historical fiction accounts of Christian heroes, called the Trailblazer Books, along with another five-volume series called Hero Tales: A Family Treasury of True Stories from the Lives of Christian Heroes.<br />
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These days, both are busy penning their own works of adult fiction. Jackson began her individual effort in 2003 with the Yada Yada Prayer Group series, inspired by her real-life Bible study group, a multi-cultural gathering of dynamic women who have played an important role in her life for over fifteen years. Since publication of the first Yada Yada Prayer Group novel, the seven-book series has sold over a half-million copies and given rise to countless prayer groups across the country and the publication of a personal prayer journal for prayer group participants. In 2008, Where Do I Go?, her first book in the four-book House of Hope series, was published. The second book in the series, Who Do I Talk To?, won a Christy Award in 2010 for excellence in Christian fiction. Recently, the fourth book of the series, Who Is My Shelter?, was nominated for Best Inspirational Novel for 2011 by RT Book Reviews. Stand by Me is the first in Jackson’s new SouledOut Sisters series.<br />
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The Jacksons have been married 45 years and have raised two children plus a Cambodian foster daughter. They continue to live in urban Chicago where, together, they enjoy writing, gardening and spending time with their grandchildren.<br />
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Visit the author's <a href="http://www.daveneta.com/">website</a>.<br />
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<div align="left"><strong><span style="color: #333399; font-size: 130%;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">SHORT BOOK DESCRIPTION:</span></span></strong></div><br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3zlYSr2TdOM/T3E7Jdrj68I/AAAAAAAAHbQ/6XHtIdDtJRU/s1600/stand+by+me_web.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3zlYSr2TdOM/T3E7Jdrj68I/AAAAAAAAHbQ/6XHtIdDtJRU/s200/stand+by+me_web.jpg" width="128" /></a>How does God expect us to get along with those people who are always causing us pain? Are we supposed to keep helping those who repeatedly take advantage of us? Exactly what is the key to living in peace with difficult people? These are the questions award-winning author Neta Jackson addresses in her latest novel, Stand by Me (Thomas Nelson), the first book of her newest series, SouledOut Sisters.<br />
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Inspired by her own Bible study group, Jackson began several years ago to write about a multi-cultural gathering of dynamic women in a collection of books known as the Yada Yada Prayer Group series. Since publication of the first Yada Yada Prayer Group novel in 2003, the seven-book series has sold over a half-million copies and given rise to countless prayer groups across the country. Jackson followed the Yada Yada novels with the four-book House of Hope series. Though the series is not dependent upon its predecessors for understanding, Jackson has used the individual lives of familiar characters to introduce some of the more complex issues prevalent in our modern society. By allowing her characters to lead the way, Jackson has shed light on issues like drug addiction, the stigma associated with HIV/AIDS and even the racial conflicts that can so easily arise within any culturally diverse group.<br />
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In her newest work, Stand by Me, Jackson introduces her readers to Kathryn Davis, a young college student who has left her prestigious Phoenix family behind to move to Chicago after dropping out of medical school against her father’s protests. Her newfound faith in Christ helps temper the realization that she has stepped out of her family’s good graces, but does little to alleviate the pain of their rejection.<br />
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When Kat discovers the dynamic multi-cultural membership at Souled Out Community Church, she longs to be part of it. But her unconventional behavior and brash eagerness have not helped her win favor with the church members. And, much to her dismay, Avis Douglass, the one woman in the church whom she most admires and would love to know better, is the one who is the most aloof.<br />
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Kat has no idea that, after being confronted by a number of serious problems all at once, Avis and her husband, Peter, are beginning to question God’s will for their lives. Having been recently estranged from her HIV positive daughter and being worried about her welfare, Avis would like nothing more than to quietly retreat into the recesses of her faith and find the answers she seeks. Her attempts to do so, however, are thwarted at every turn by the flamboyant Kat, who has apparently decided to foist herself on their lives whether they want her to or not.<br />
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</div>Product Details:<br />
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List Price: $15.99<br />
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Paperback: 400 pages<br />
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Publisher: Thomas Nelson (March 13, 2012)<br />
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Language: English<br />
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ISBN-10: 1595548645<br />
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ISBN-13: 978-1595548641<br />
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<span style="color: #cc0000;"><strong><span style="font-size: large;">AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:</span> </strong><br />
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<div style="height: 307px; overflow: auto;"><h2 style="text-align: center;"><br />
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<b>PROLOGUE</b></h2><div style="height: 22pt; position: relative; width: auto;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial;"><span style="font-size: 15px;"><i>Midwest Music Festival, Central Illinois</i></span></span></div><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
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<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=1872255993446278117" name="0.1.3__GoBack"></a><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Kat Davies ducked into the billowing exhibition tent staked down in a large pasture in central Illinois like a grounded Goodyear blimp. She’d been at the Midwest Music Fest three days already—didn’t know it was a Christian festival until she got here—and needed a little respite from the music pulsing morning-till-night on the Jazz Stage, Gospel Stage, Alternative Stage, Rock Stage, Folk Stage, and a few more she’d forgotten.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Besides, she’d be heading back to Phoenix in two days, and sooner or later she needed to figure out how to tell her parents she’d “given her heart to Jesus” after the Resurrection Band concert last night. Maybe this tent had a quiet corner where she could think. Or pray. Not that she had a clue how to do that.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Kat had a good idea how they’d react. Her mother would f lutter and say something like, “Don’t take it too seriously, Kathryn dear. Getting religion is just something everyone does for a year or two.” And her father? If he didn’t blow his stack at what he’d call “another one of your little distractions,” he’d give her a lecture about keeping her priorities straight: Finish pre-med at the University of Arizona. Go to medical school. Do her internship at a prestigious hospital. Follow in the Davies’ tradition. Make her family tree of prominent physicians proud.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Except . . . she’d walked out of her biochemistry class at UA one day and realized she didn’t want to become a doctor. She’d tutored ESL kids the summer after high school and realized she liked working with kids. (“Well, you can be a pediatrician like your Uncle Bernard, darling,” her mother had said.) And the student action group on the UA campus sponsoring workshops on “Living Green” and “Sustainable Foods” had really gotten her blood pumping. (Another one of her “distractions,” accord- ing to her father.)</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Was it too late to pursue something else? Her parents were already bragging to friends and co-workers that their Kathryn had received her letter of acceptance into medical school a few months ago. Feeling squeezed till she couldn’t breathe, she’d jumped at the chance to attend a music fest in Illinois with a carload of other students—friends of friends—just to get away from the pressure for a while.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">What she hadn’t expected was to find so many teenagers and twenty-somethings excited about Jesus. Jesus! Not the go- to-church-at-Christmas-and-<wbr></wbr>Easter Jesus, the only Jesus she’d known growing up the daughter of a wealthy Phoenix physician and socialite mother. That Jesus, frankly, had a hard time com- peting with Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">But these people talked about a Jesus who cared about poor people. A Jesus who created the world and told humans to take care of it. A Jesus who might not be blond and blue-eyed after all. A Jesus who said, “Love your neighbor”—and that neighbor might be black or brown or speak Spanish or Chinese. A Jesus who said, “All have sinned” and “You must be born again.” The Son of God, who’d died to take away the sins of the world.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">That Jesus.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">That’s the Jesus she’d asked to be Lord of her life, even though she wasn’t exactly sure what that meant. But she desper- ately longed for something—Someone—to help her figure out who she was and what she should do with her life. The guitar player in the band who’d challenged the arm-waving music fans last night to be Christ-followers had said, “Jesus came to give you life—life more abundantly! But first you must give your life to Him.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">That’s what she wanted. Abundant life! A life sold out to something she could believe in. To give herself to one hundred percent. So she’d prayed the sinner’s prayer with a woman in a denim skirt whose name she never learned, and a “peace like a river” f looded her spirit.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Last night, anyway.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">But by the light of day, she was still heading in a direction—medical school—that she didn’t want to go.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Big fans circulated the air in the large tent, though mostly it just moved the stif ling July heat around. Thick, curly strands of her long, dark hair had slipped out of the clip on the back of her head and stuck in wet tendrils on her skin. Redoing the clip to get the damp hair off her neck and face, she wan- dered the aisles, idly picking up brochures about Compassion International, Habitat for Humanity, and YWAM. Huh. What if she just dropped out of pre-med and did something like this Youth With A Mission thing. Far from Phoenix and the Davies Family Tradition. Go to Haiti or India or—</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“Nice boots,” giggled a female voice nearby.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Kat glanced up from the brochure. A cute brunette with a shaggy pixie cut grinned at her from behind a booth that said Find Your Calling at CCU! Kat self-consciously looked down at the Arizona-chic cowboy boots peeking out beneath her designer jeans and f lushed. Ever since she’d arrived at the fes- tival, she felt as if she’d walked into a time-warp—girls in tank tops, peasant skirts, and pierced nostrils, guys wearing pony- tails, tattoos, shredded jeans, and T-shirts proclaiming Jesus Freak. Kat had felt as conspicuous as a mink coat in a second- hand store.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“Thanks. I think.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">The young woman, dressed in khaki Capris and a feminine lemon-yellow tee, laughed. “This your first time to the Fest? Where’re you from?”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Kat felt strangely relieved to be talking to someone else who didn’t look like a throwback to the seventies. “Phoenix. First time.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“Wow. You came a long way.” </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“You?”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“Detroit. But during the year I’m a student at CCU in Chicago. I get a huge discount off my festival fee if I sit at this booth a couple hours a day during the Fest.” The girl grinned again and extended her hand across the stacks of informational literature. “I’m Brygitta Walczak.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Kat shook her hand. “Kathryn Davies. But my friends call me Kat. With a K.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“Like ‘kitty kat’ ? That’s cute. And . . . blue eyes with all that dark, curly hair? Bet the guys love that.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Ignoring the remark, Kat glanced up at the banner above the booth. “What does CCU stand for?”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“Chicago Crista University. Usually we just call it Crista U. Located on the west side of Chicago. I’ll be a senior next year. Christian ed major.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“Christian ed? What’s that?”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“You’re kidding.” Brygitta eyed her curiously. “Mm. You’re not kidding. Uh, are you a Christian?”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Kat allowed a wry smile. “For about twelve hours.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">The pixie-haired girl’s mouth dropped open, and then her amber eyes lit up. “That is so cool! Hey . . . want a Coke or something? I’ve got a cooler back here with some soft drinks. Wanna sit? I’d love some company.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Brygitta dragged a folding chair from an unmanned booth nearby, and Kat found herself swapping life stories with her new friend. Unlike Kat, who had no siblings, Brygitta came from a large Polish family, had been raised in the Catholic church, “went Protestant” at a Youth for Christ rally in high school, planned to get a master’s degree at Crista U, and wanted to be a missionary overseas or a director of Christian education somewhere.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">“Sorry I’m late, Bree,” said a male voice. “Uh-oh. Two gor- geous females. You’ve cloned yourself. I’m really in trouble now.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Kat looked up. A young man about their same age grinned at them across the booth. He was maybe six feet, with short, sandy-brown hair combed forward over a nicely tanned face, wire-rim sunglasses shading his eyes. No obvious tattoos or body piercings. Just cargo shorts and a T-shirt that said CCU Soccer.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Brygitta jumped up. “Oh, hi, Nick. This is Kat Davies. She’s from the University of Arizona, first time at the Fest. Nick Taylor is my relief. He’s a seminary student at Crista—well, headed that way, anyway.”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Nick slid off his shades and flashed a smile, hazel eyes teasing. “So, Miss Blue Eyes. Has Brygitta talked you into coming to CCU yet?”</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Kat laughed and started to shake her head . . . and then stopped as her eyes caught the logo on the banner across the booth. Find Your Calling at CCU.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Arial; font-size: 11pt;">Transfer to Crista University? Why not?</span></div></div></div><br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1595548645/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img">Stand by Me</a> by <a href="http://daveneta.com/">Neta Jackson</a> is the first book in the SouledOut Sisters series, a spin-off from the Yada Yada Prayer Group series. Avis Douglass has long been the disciplinarian of Yada Yada, keeping her sisters in line like she does as the principal of a Chicago elementary school. But her life is taking some turns that leave her frustrated and distant from the Lord. When Kat Davies enters her life, Avis wants nothing to do with the do-good college student who has a whole lot of ideas about how others should live their lives that don't have much to do with reality. And Kat keeps popping up in Avis' life, attending her church at SouledOut, moving into her building, and the two women couldn't have less in common. I don't know why I keep doubting Neta Jackson. When it was announced that she was ending the Yada Yada Prayer Group series, I couldn't imagine any series being as compelling, until I met Gabby Fairbanks in the House of Hope series. When that series was ending, I was again disappointed and didn't think a series starring no-nonsense Avis would be as moving, but Jackson just keeps proving me wrong! She really throws Avis' world into confusion, allowing us to really see this strong woman of faith and see how she keeps her faith through the hard times. But Jackson keeps Avis' edge in the relationship with good-intentioned Kat. Kat is another character who at first seems unrelatable, but as I kept reading, I could see the heart of this beautiful young woman who wants to make a difference and has absolutely no idea where to begin. The relationship between these two women is thoroughly entertaining and poignant, especially when at the climax Jackson cuts through the noise and exposes the hole in Kat's heart in such a way that it opens Avis'. Jackson's writing is also a treat, and I don't know how I am going to get through the waiting until the next book is released!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-88070766117820539212012-04-13T13:49:00.000-06:002012-04-13T13:49:23.162-06:00The Fiddler<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div align="center"><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/5500/1432/1600/CFBAreviewer_gif.0.gif"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/5500/1432/320/CFBAreviewer_gif.0.gif" style="cursor: hand; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" /></a></div><br />
<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209779">The Fiddler</a></span></center> <center>Bethany House Publishers (April 10, 2012)</center> <center>by</center> <center><span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.beverlylewis.com/">Beverly Lewis</a></span></center> <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE AUTHOR:</span></b><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-B3WCa7NM1i4/ToklSo1nK-I/AAAAAAAAEEM/OFwhNlSm65o/s1600/bev-homepage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-B3WCa7NM1i4/ToklSo1nK-I/AAAAAAAAEEM/OFwhNlSm65o/s200/bev-homepage.jpg" width="146" /></a></div>Beverly's first venture into adult fiction is the best-selling trilogy, The Heritage of Lancaster County, including The Shunning, a suspenseful saga of Katie Lapp, a young Amish woman drawn to the modern world by secrets from her past. The book is loosely based on the author's maternal grandmother, Ada Ranck Buchwalter, who left her Old Order Mennonite upbringing to marry a Bible College student. One Amish-country newspaper claimed Beverly's work to be "a primer on Lancaster County folklore" and offers "an insider's view of Amish life."<br />
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Booksellers across the country, and around the world, have spread the word of Beverly's tender tales of Plain country life. A clerk in a Virginia bookstore wrote, "Beverly's books have a compelling freshness and spark. You just don't run across writing like that every day. I hope she'll keep writing stories about the Plain people for a long, long time."<br />
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A member of the National League of American Pen Women, as well as a Distinguished Alumnus of Evangel University, Lewis has written over 80 books for children, youth, and adults, many of them award-winning. She and her husband, David, make their home in Colorado, where they enjoy hiking, biking, and spending time with their family. They are also avid musicians and fiction "book worms." <br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b> <br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DlEJ_yIcXFo/T4T0V_N03YI/AAAAAAAAEhI/CEX5gmew3v0/s1600/Fiddler_The.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DlEJ_yIcXFo/T4T0V_N03YI/AAAAAAAAEhI/CEX5gmew3v0/s200/Fiddler_The.jpg" width="130" /></a></div>Come home to Hickory Hollow, Pennsylvania--the beloved setting where Beverly Lewis's celebrated Amish novels began--with new characters and new stories of drama, romance, and the ties that draw people together.<br />
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A wrong turn in a rainstorm leads Englisher Amelia Devries to Michael Hostetler--and the young Amishman's charming Old Order community of Hickory Hollow. Despite their very different backgrounds, Amelia and Michael both feel hemmed in by the expectations of others and struggle with how to find room for their own hopes. And what first seems to be a chance encounter might just change their lives forever. <br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209779">The Fiddler</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/04/fiddler.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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Watch the book video: <br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764209779">The Fiddler</a> by <a href="http://beverlylewis.com/">Beverly Lewis</a> is the first book in the Home to Hickory Hollow series. Amelia DeVries is an acclaimed violinist who has been secretly finding joy in playing under the pseudonym Amy Lee on the country music circuit as a fiddler. When her manager and boyfriend found out about her secret life, they are both horrified that she would sacrifice her career in classical music and her father's dreams. Driving home on a rainy night, she takes a wrong turn in the woods of Pennsylvania, and when her car gets a flat tire, she takes refuge in a small cabin. Michael Hostetler is also struggling with disappointing his family. As a twenty-five-year old man, he should have been baptized into the Amish faith years ago, and his father has given him an ultimatum: join the faith or get out. But Michael has been attending college and learning how to draw blueprints. He is drawn to the "fancy" life, and only his love for his family holds him back. When Michael and Amelia meet there is a immediate recognition that they are in similar places in their lives, and as they spend a quiet evening in the cabin waiting out the storm, they forge a bond that just might change their lives forever. I love how Lewis gently exposes the quiet chemistry between the pair without making it about physical attraction. These two souls feel right together from their first moment shared on the page. Lewis, as usual, portrays both the good and bad sides of being Amish and how the attraction of the Englisch world pulls on young people who desire something more out of life and refuse to believe that leaving the faith means leaving God. Michael and Amelia's relationship blossoms slowly and truly, making readers fall in love with them as they fall in love with each other. I look forward to the next book in the series. </div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-40398454181970554232012-04-09T11:08:00.000-06:002012-04-09T11:08:58.349-06:00The Last Plea Bargain<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qeaPhNEE8GI/T4MXnoQekqI/AAAAAAAADBs/qlunU4_H_KY/s1600/images.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qeaPhNEE8GI/T4MXnoQekqI/AAAAAAAADBs/qlunU4_H_KY/s1600/images.jpg" /></a></div><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1414333218/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img">The Last Plea Bargain</a> by<a href="http://randysinger.net/"> Randy Singer</a> follows up with Jamie Brock, who was a young law student in False Witness. Now Jamie is a prosecutor for the district attorney's office. She became a lawyer to avenge her mother's murder at the hands of a drug addict twelve years ago when she was just sixteen, and she intends to see the murderer die for his crime, and his appeals are running out, despite the best attempts of his attorney, Mace James. When Caleb Tate, the attorney who originally represented the murderer and nearly destroyed Jamie's father on the witness stand, is charged with the murder of his wife, Rikki, Jamie is determined to make Tate pay for both Rikki's death and for what he did to her father. But Tate isn't about to go down without a fight, and he brings the entire justice system to a halt when he gets every suspect waiting for trial to refuse a plea bargain. This bogs down the system to the point where non-violent offenders are simply released back into society. Meanwhile, Mace is trying to race the clock to find evidence for a new trial or to set his client free before the August 7 execution date, but what he finds just may change Jamie's belief in the death penalty as well as what she knows about the night her mother died. Singer has written another fast-paced and suspenseful legal drama with twists and turns that kept me on toes. Jamie is a likable character, and the reader quickly sympathizes with her pain. Singer's writing just gets better with each novel; the dialogue is believable and the action is tight. I can't wait to see what he will come up with next.<br />
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Thank you to Side Door Communications for providing me with a copy of this book for review!</div>Christy Locksteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04200380313250803301noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24672637.post-546758359979916652012-04-02T16:21:00.000-06:002012-04-02T16:21:16.483-06:00Cooking the Books<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div align="center"><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/5500/1432/1600/CFBAreviewer_gif.0.gif"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/5500/1432/320/CFBAreviewer_gif.0.gif" style="cursor: hand; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" /></a></div><br />
<center><span style="font-size: 130%;">This week, the</span></center> <center><a href="http://www.christianfictionblogalliance.com/"><span style="font-size: 100%;">Christian Fiction Blog Alliance</span></a></center> <center><span style="font-size: 100%;">is introducing</span></center> <center><span style="color: #993300; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1426733887">Cooking The Books</a></span></center> <center>Abingdon Press (April 2012)</center> <center>by</center> <center><span style="color: #006600; font-size: 130%;"><a href="http://bonniescalhoun.com/">Bonnie S. Calhoun</a></span></center> <br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-8HpqyeWIvG4/T3j0oFiw67I/AAAAAAAAEcs/SD5Id7OgLKk/s1600/IMG_0026FB.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-8HpqyeWIvG4/T3j0oFiw67I/AAAAAAAAEcs/SD5Id7OgLKk/s200/IMG_0026FB.JPG" width="156" /></a></div>As the Owner/Director of the Christian Fiction Blog Alliance Bonnie has helped use the 220+ blogs of the Alliance to promote many titles on the Christian bestseller list. She also owns and publishes the Christian Fiction Online magazine which is devoted to readers and writers of Christian fiction. She is the Northeast Zone Director for American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW). At ACFW she was named the ‘Mentor of the Year,’ for 2011, and she is the current President of (CAN) Christian Authors Network. Bonnie is also the Appointment Coordinator for both the Colorado Christian Writers Conference and the Greater Philadelphia Christian Writers Conference. <br />
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In her spare time she is an avid social media junkie, and teaches Facebook, Twitter, Blogging and HTML as recreational occupations. She also has a novel coming out in the Abingdon Quilts of Love series. Her novel Pieces of the Heart will publish August of 2013.<br />
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Bonnie and her husband Bob live in a log cabin on 15 acres in upstate area of Binghamton, New York with a dog and cat who consider the humans as wait-staff.<br />
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<b><span style="color: #ff6600; font-size: 100%;">ABOUT THE BOOK</span></b> <br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UQzjiISk4s4/T3j1AegvyzI/AAAAAAAAEc0/T421pThkujY/s1600/Cooking_The+Books.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UQzjiISk4s4/T3j1AegvyzI/AAAAAAAAEc0/T421pThkujY/s200/Cooking_The+Books.jpg" width="130" /></a></div>After her mother dies from a heart attack, Sloane Templeton goes from Cyber Crimes Unit to bookstore owner before she can blink. She also "inherits" a half-batty store manager; a strange bunch of little old people from the neighborhood who meet at the store once a week, but never read books, called the Granny Oakleys Book Club; and Aunt Verline, who fancies herself an Iron Chef when in reality you need a cast iron stomach to partake of her culinary disasters. And with a group like this you should never ask, “What else can go wrong?”<br />
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A lot! Sloane begins to receive cyber threats. While Sloane uses her computer forensic skills to uncover the source of the threats, it is discovered someone is out to kill her. Can her life get more crazy?<br />
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If you would like to read the first chapter of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1426733887">Cooking The Books</a>, go <a href="http://thestorybeginnings.blogspot.com/2012/04/cooking-books.html">HERE</a>.<br />
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Watch the book video: <br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="233" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/oOuoePsH5as?rel=0" width="400"></iframe><br />
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If you'd like to read interviews with Bonnie, try these:<br />
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<a href="http://everybodyneedsalittleromance.com/2011/10/16/cooking-the-books-by-bonnie-s-calhoun/">Everbody Needs A Little Romance</a><br />
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<a href="http://everybodyneedsalittleromance.com/2011/10/16/cooking-the-books-by-bonnie-s-calhoun/">A Christian Writers World</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.novelrocket.com/2012/03/meet-bonnie-calhoun-writing-worlds.html">Novel Rocket</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.fictionfinder.com/author_interview/read/interview_with_bonnie_calhoun">ACFW - Fiction Finder</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1426733887">Cooking the Books</a> by <a href="http://bonniescalhoun.com/">Bonnie Calhoun</a> is the first book in the Sloane Templeton series about a thirty-something divorcee with far too much on her plate. Sloane is still recovering from the unexpected death of her mother, Camille, who ran Beckam's Brew & Books, a bookstore known for its great coffee and even better selection of books. Unfortunately, Sloane's heart isn't in selling books; she misses her time working with a cyber-crime unit at NYU that she had to give up after her nasty divorce from a man who shall remain unnamed. In the midst of her new romance with hottie Andreas, comes cyber-threats on the shop's computers, word that her mother's last big purchase may be worth a million dollars, and a realty group is playing dirty trying to get Sloane to sell the building. Calhoun's Sloane is nothing like the usual detective. She is not calm, cool, or collected; nor is she glamorous and thin. Sloane loves her Red Velvet cake so much that she abandoned her jeans months ago and is known to lose her cool on a nearly minute to minute basis. So much so, that it's a bit frightening to know that she's packing heat! Sloane is the perfect heroine for the rest of us, who would be terrified of pointing a gun at another person, wouldn't know the first thing about solving a mystery, and whose taste in men isn't exactly noteworthy. Sloane's antics made me laugh, gasp with fear, and by the end, feel like this was a good friend I was sad to leave. I love how Calhoun has layered a long-arcing story over the other smaller stories in this first volume, and I pray (please God!) that she gets to tell the rest of the tale!<br />
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