Completed: January 4, 2012
Rating: 7.5/10
Review: Jones is a young doctor with amazing neuro-surgeon abilities. But when he is unable to help his fiance at the scene of an accident, Jones is shaken to the core and leaves surgery in favor of teaching in a medical school. When Lara Blair, the owner of biomedical engineering company comes calling on his door to help develop a robotic surgical tool that goes deep into the brain his immediate reaction is thank you but no. But Lara is a determined young woman for urgent reasons way beyond the thrill of invention and money. As their friendship develops Jones must push beyond his fears and find the courage to re-enter the surgical suite as more than a teacher.
While a little slow moving for me in a few places this was a wonderful story of love and pain, the courage to move beyond and of recognizing God's gifting in your life. The research on robotic surgery really showed but was placed into the story in a very easily readable, and definitely not dry, way. Lara and Jones relationship was very interesting as it developed beyond the pursuit of business.
Completed: January 10, 2012
Rating: 9.5/10
Review: Max and Jade's story continues as Max returns from rehab. With much to make amends for, he and Jade start to try to rebuild their family which now includes Max's son whom Jade as been raising as her own while Max was at rehab. Their story was believable as they try to work out the difficulties of trust issues that come with addiction, and as they face secrets again trying to come into their lives and blow them apart, even while trying to know and follow where they feel is God leading them. It was easy to cheer for them and feel happy for their triumphs even while feeling your heart sink with their trials and mistakes. This was one of those stories that didn't mince on difficulties but at the same time left the reader feeling uplifted. Definite thumbs up in my opinion.
Completed: January 30, 2012
Rating: 9.5/10
Review: Truman Wiley is a character you love to hate. He's got issues and plenty of them. Having lost his high profile job with a news network, he is now estranged from his family, has a major gambling habit, is in debt and running from a loan shark, has lost his car and the cabin he was living in. He is sarcastic, a dead beat dad and a missing in action husband who has not been there for his wife. And his son is dying. He is at the end of his rope when an opportunity to write the story of a man on death row comes his way. Conley was convicted of murder and is set to face death in one month. Always maintaining his innocence and having had a prison conversion to Christianity, he has given up hope of having his sentence over-turned and wants to have something good come out of the situation. He wants to donate his heart to a dying teen. A dying teen who happens to be Truman's own son. Truman reluctantly takes the job, not thrilled that anything to do with Christianity is involved, but the family also happens to go to his wife's church. And he desperately needs the money. As he starts looking into the death of the murdered hair dresser, he starts to come across evidence that could mean Conley has been telling the truth all along. But telling the truth would mean that in all likelyhood his son will die.
I thought this was an great, albiet heavy, read, one that brings you face to face with how you think and feel about some tough subjects. I felt Fabry handled the personality of an addict very well. While I have not had experience with a gambling addict, I have known and had to deal with a drug addict. Totally narcissistic, running from all responsibility, all their decisions, even to the detriment of all their relationships, being made through the lens of their addiction was told in a very realistic way. I thought the relationships between Truman, his wife and his children's viewpoints was told seamlessly as it went back and forth between them. Yes, the personality made me mad but that is the nature of an addicted person.
Conley as the convicted murderer who maintains his innocence but is resolved with the fact he is going to die, also brings in the issues of capital punishment and of organ donation. The author, through the story, shows the great need out there for organ donation and asks us how far are we willing to go with it? The controversy of organ donation by death row prisoners is brought to the forefront and raises many questions. Is it ethical? Do people want the organs of who they might feel are "evil" and "bad". Will more prisoners be killed quicker on death row just so their organs can be harvested for transplants? All these questions and more are looked at through the story and makes you think where your stand is on very hot button issues. The main character also wrestles with the fact that he may have evidence that in the very least would throw doubt onto the prisoner's conviction and that the revealing of it will remove all chances for his son and mean his death.
As a reader, I was faced with how I view other's shortcomings and failures as well as my own. Is there a place for second chances even in the most dire of circumstances?
For a many layered story, I thought the author wove it together well, bringing an ending I was not expecting at all. He held the suspense of what would happen right down to the wire and left me with lots to think about. And that is a kind of story I like. One that leaves me chewing on it for days to come.
Completed: February 7, 2012
Rating: 6.5/10
Review: After being persuaded to be the bride at her town's Founder's Day celebrations, Shay is shocked to see that the "groom" waiting at the top of the aisle is non other than Travis, her first love, and the man that left her on the courthouse steps 14 years earlier to pursue his rodeo dreams. Using the premise of a couple becoming accidentally married in reality when all they were doing was a reenactment of a historical event, the author explores topics such as forgiveness, trust and worrying about what others think. It is a romance story so there is a very strong romantic element. I enjoyed the storyline of Travis trying win back Shay's heart. In turn, I thought the story of Shay's feelings and struggle in believing and trusting Travis, even with his most honorable intentions, after being abandoned both by him and her husband in her past was believable and well written. Throw in her childhood poverty, her desperation at losing her ranch and her desire to do the best by her young daughter and I could certainly see where she was coming from. Because it is a romance novel, there are parts where the two run into situations where they're attraction to each other takes over. While the feelings are described, a few of which while coming close, did not cross my personal lines, but do get intense and did make me consider whether I would want my teenager to read. And because I am reviewing with my personal Christian convictions, there is an element regarding that within the story that made me a bit uncomfortable. ( I don't know how else to say it without telling a part of the story). All in all, it was a good weekend read for those who enjoy a romance novel that has some exploration of issues we all go through thrown in.
Completed: February 10, 2011
Rating: 9.5/10
Review: In 1969, Rebecca's family moved to Sellerstown, North Carolina. Rebecca was just a pre-schooler when her father felt the call of God to pastor a small church in this small farming community. They were welcomed openly and as the small congregation grew all who attended respected and loved Pastor Robert, his wife Ramona and Rebecca. All except one man who attended the church but was not actually a member. Being wealthy and having a strong control over the people of the town, he was not pleased when decisions in the church started to not go his way. Over the next five years, this "upstanding" member of the town unleashed an attack that is almost indescribable against Rebecca's family in order to drive them from the town. The Nichol's family lived under constant harassment, threats, shootings and even dynamite bombings for 5 years planned methodically to scare them away. Rebecca never knew a time in her childhood when she wasn't afraid. Then an event occured that changed Rebecca's life forever.
But the family also lived with a deep faith in God, His calling, and His love and forgiveness. Pastor Nichols believed no one was beyond redemption and believed in walking out the forgiveness of God in a spirit of humility and love. He took it very seriously where in the bible where Jesus said:
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.”
He and Ramona instilled deep into Rebecca's heart that forgiveness, for the Christian, was a way of life and not an option.
This story touched me deeply. We are studying offense and forgiveness in my ladies study group (see book in my sidebar) so the timing of this book coming into my hands could only be from God. It lined up perfectly. In our discussions on forgiveness us ladies at the group go through a whole lot of "ya but's". This story is the testimony of someone who actually walked out that forgiveness that we are with such difficulty trying to wrap our heads around.
While most of my reviews, unless a book tour review, are being done on my book blog, I felt I had to review this one here so more people would know of it. I will not lie, this book was in places grievous to read. It broke my heart what this family went through. What a person out of rage and jealousy can perpetrate upon others is unbelievable. There were several times when I just cried for them and my heart literally felt heavy. But it is also a story of redemption, of faith, of hope and of the power of God's grace to forgive the actions of even your worst enemy. Rebecca's last chapter teaching on forgiveness is biblically solid and her story shows it is possible, that God doesn't ask us to do something He will not give us the grace and strength to carry out. I would say this book has had a profound effect on me and has faced me square on with the "ya-but's" excuses in my life. Unforgiveness is rampant in society and causes a myriad of problems in people's lives. It can be passed down in families and amongst friends. It puts us into chains and takes us captive and puts us into a chokehold that God never meant for us to live with. This story shows that forgiveness can profoundly effect us, whether we are the forgiver or the one being forgiven. I borrowed it from the library, but I will be buying my own copy so my kids (17, 20 & 22) can read it and so that I can lend it out to those struggling with forgiving others. I highly, highly recommend this read.
Completed: February 22, 2012
Rating: 9.5/10
Review: Kate Winters is a young lady from a fairly well off family in 1855 Westerville, Ohio. She is one of a very small group of young ladies who are the first women to attend Otterbein College and with graduating comes the first step towards her secret dreams of leaving Westerville before the family secrets and her Mother's controlling suffocate her. But she is hindered from achieving that dream when, because of her painful shyness, she is not able to complete an assignment that requires she make a speech in front of the class. At her Mother's insistence she tries out for a musicale being done at the college, her mother hoping she gets over her shyness and Kate in the hopes that she can use it to make an escape and run away from home & her Mother's schemes to marry her off to a wealthy young man who also attends the college.
When Ben Hanby hears Kate sing, though she is quiet and shy, he is taken with her voice and quiet demeanor. He immediately wants to cast her for the solo in the musicale. As Ben starts to develop feelings beyond the musicale for Kate he is torn because of his own secrets that he must keep as his faith leads him to work alongside his parents for the Underground Railroad. While on a "railroad business" trip that coincides with a shopping trip that his mother is making that includes Kate, Ben and Kate are unexpectedly thrown together into circumstances that goes beyond the musicale and brings their hearts together in a way neither could have imagined.
This is the second book in the Saddler's Legacy Series by the author. Though the I did not read the first, this story was totally easy to follow and didn't leave me wondering what was going on. It is a fictional story that was based on historical facts of the Hanby family who were very involved in aiding slaves to find their freedom through the Underground Railroad and on Ben Hanby specifically, whose published song became one of the hallmarks of the abolitionist movement. I really enjoyed all the research the author made into the main characters that were real persons and how she developed their personalities. The traditions of the day came across in the descriptions and events and were told with, what I thought, were great detail. I loved paragraphs such as this describing female equestrians at a circus:
"The equestriennes vaulted from one horse's back to another, changing places with astonishing precision. A clergyman had endorsed this act, with women in their knee-length tutus and exposed legs in tights? It was no different from the ballet, she supposed. Nonetheless, she sensed Ben's shyness from the determined set of his head, as if he dared not even glance at any of his lady companions while such a display of limbs occurred--not just ankles, but entire calves, practically even knees when the tutus bounced. "
And this one describing a train ride:
"The air shimmered with the heat of the woodstove down by the door, but here in the middle of the car, Ben had to pull his muffler closer to his neck against the cold. Woodstoves could not combat the drafts from the windows of a wooden box on wheels, speeding across the landscape at twenty miles per hour."
The contrast to today's world is made so well by the descriptions of the decorum and transportation of the time it made me smile.
But the story also told of the heartache of the slaves and their flights to freedom and of the deep convictions of those helping them. It was beautifully written and conveyed their deep convictions and courage. I would love to get ahold of the first book in the series which centers around the parents of Ben Hanby and their work. I would definitely recommend this read for historical fiction fans, clean love story fans and/or those interested in the history of the Underground Railroad.
Completed: February 23, 2010
Rating: 10/10
Review: Grace Graham is a young single mother who has spent her life running from the tough situations in her life. She has just broken up with her fiance so when her sister phones and basically demands she come home to help care for their father who is having knee replacement surgery, Grace reluctantly agrees. Now she must face her anger at her father, whom she blames for her mother's death. And all she wants to do is turn around and run. But her four year old son is thrilled to meet his baby cousin for the first time so she tries to stick it out as best as she can. But when Dylan starts to get ill, and it turns out the illness is a direct result of decisions she had made in the past all she wants to do us run again. And now her decision has not only affected her and her son but many families within the community. But she has nowhere left to run. She must find the courage and strength to stay and face what happens and grab the second and last chance she has been given to make things right.
I could not put this book down and read it within a day. That is unusual for me but it was easy reading that just drew me right in and didn't let go until the very end. The author, in my opinion, presented really well the arguments for and against immunizations. And in the context of this debate she tells a wonderful story of coming full circle, second chances and doing the right thing in spite of our fears. I was drawn in by all the characters, everyone of them was interesting to me. The situation was complex and unthinkable and their emotions and reactions were very real and raw. It had my heart gripped. An excellent read!
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