Category: Book Review

Book Review | Belinda Blake and the Snake in the Grass

I don’t like snakes—something my Australian friends mock me for. Naming no names, but one of my editing clients wrote a snake into her book especially because she knew I didn’t like snakes. That’s what friends are for, right?

Anyway, about Belinda Blake and the Snake in the Grass.

I hoped the title was a metaphor, but that hope was dashed with the very first line …

"The first time I saw Stone Carrington the fifth, I had a snake wrapped around my neck."

Yes, the snake is a major feature. But he (I assume it was a he) is also a great character who sets the tone of the novel and provides some much-needed comic relief.

Belinda Blake is an exotic pet sitter and videogame reviewer who’s just moved into the carriage house on the Carrington estate. She’s settling in well … until she finds a dead woman in the garden. As she says:

"I didn't know the ... protocol ... for finding a dead body outside my rental house."

Well, who does?

Belinda starts investigating but soon finds that someone or someones don’t want her sticking her nose in. That—and encouragement from Stone Carrington the fifth—only strengthens her desire to find out what happened and why. And before something happens to her …

This is Heather Day Gilbert’s first Belinda Blake novel, and her first novel for the general market.

I’ve previously read her historical fiction and contemporary Christian mysteries, but I think this is her best yet. The plot is tight, the characters are well portrayed, and the writing is top notch. Most of all, Belinda Blake is a clever and witty heroine (albeit one with strange taste in pets). She’s everything I look for in a contemporary mystery heroine.

Recommended for fans of mystery and romantic comedy who like strong heroines and novels written in first person point of view.

Thanks to Kensington Books and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

About Heather Day Gilbert

Heather Day Gilbert, an ECPA Christy award finalist and Grace award winner, writes contemporary mysteries and Viking historicals. Her novels feature small towns, family relationships, and women who aren’t afraid to protect those they love.

Publisher’s Weekly gave Heather’s Viking historical Forest Child a starred review, saying it is “an engaging story depicting timeless human struggles with faith, love, loyalty, and leadership.”

Find Heather Day Gilbert online at:

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About Belinda Blake and the Snake in the Grass:

When exotic pet-sitter Belinda Blake moves into a carriage house in tony Greenwich, Connecticut, she’s hoping to find some new clients. Instead she discovers a corpse in the garden—and a knack for solving murders . . .


Pet-sitter Belinda Blake doesn’t rattle easily, but move-in day has been eventful, to say the least. The python in her care tried to slither to freedom—just as she met Stone Carrington V, her landlords’ disarmingly handsome son. With the constrictor back in its cage, she heads out to the garden, only to discover a designer shoe poking out of the boxwood hedge—attached to a woman’s dead body.

The victim, Margo Fenton, was a Carrington family friend, and no one in their circle seems above suspicion. Between client trips to Manhattan and visits to her family in upstate New York, Belinda begins to put the pieces together. But though she’s falling for Stone’s numerous charms, Belinda wonders if she’s cozying up to a killer. And soon, daily contact with a deadly reptile might be the least dangerous part of her life . . .

You can find Belinda Blake and the Snake in the Grass online at:

Amazon US | Amazon AU | Goodreads

 

Weaver's Needle by Robin Carroll

Book Review | Weaver’s Needle by Robin Carroll

It’s Throwback Thursday, which means it’s time to share a review of an older book or reshare an old review. Today I’m resharing my review of Weaver’s Needle by Robin Carroll, which first appeared at Suspense Sisters Reviews.

Weaver’s Needle was an excellent thriller, with lots of questions, lots of plot turns, an evildoer I didn’t see coming (although I might have if the novel hadn’t been so fast paced), and a real twist ending.

Despite my bias for romantic suspense over straight suspense, I actually preferred the suspense elements of Weaver’s Needle to the romance. Who was behind the murder? Who is threatening Landry and Nickolai as they work together to find the lost map and perhaps solve the murder … and the mystery of the lost mine? What is the significance of the strange scenes about the Native American rituals?

There was also a compelling subplot about Nickolai and his relationship with his teenage sister, a schizophrenic in full-time care. Nickolai blames himself for not recognising the signs difference between normal teenage acting out and serious mental illness—a mistake which had tragic repercussions. It’s tough to incorporate mental illness into a novel, and I thought it was done well.

Next to all that, it might be inevitable that the romance element wasn’t going to be as strong. I could see the building attraction between Landry and Nickolai, but there was always the issue that Landry was a strong, praying Christian, and Nickolai an unbeliever. I thought this was glossed over, which affected my enjoyment of the romance.

But don’t let that deter you from reading Weaver’s Needle if you like thrill-of-the-chase mysteries with depth.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

About Robin Carroll

Robin Carroll

Robin Caroll grew up in Louisiana with her nose in a book. She still has the complete Trixie Belden series, and her love for mysteries and suspense has only increased with her age.

Robin’s passion has always been to tell stories to entertain others and come alongside them on their faith journey—aspects Robin weaves into each of her published novels.

Best-selling author of thirty-plus novels, ROBIN CAROLL writes Southern stories of mystery and suspense, with a hint of romance to entertain readers. Her books have been recognized in several awards, including the Carol Award, HOLT Medallion, Daphne du Maurier, RT Reviewer’s Choice Award, and more.

When she isn’t writing, Robin spends quality time with her husband of three decades, her three beautiful daughters and two handsome grandsons, and their character-filled pets at home in the South.

Robin serves the writing community as Executive/Conference Director for ACFW.

Find Robin Carroll online at:

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About Weaver’s Needle

Two recovery specialists.
One murder.
A hunt for the Dutchman’s Lost Gold Mine becomes a race of survival.

Former Army MP Landry Parker fell into the recovery specialist role quite by accident—to help her ailing father. Now that she’s on her own, she is determined to prove herself and honor her family legacy.

After being shot in the line of duty, former police officer Nickolai Baptiste became a recovery specialist, and he’s good at his job—maybe even the best.

A potential client pits Landry and Nickolai against one another to find the Dutchman’s Lost Gold Mine map that was stolen from her murdered husband, and the potential payday is too enticing to pass up. The trail takes them from New Orleans to Weaver’s Needle in Arizona where legend claims the mine is hidden. Landry and Nickolai are no strangers to adventure, but the unlikely partners quickly discover there’s someone after the treasure and there are those who want to ensure the lost mine in Arizona’s Superstition Mountain stays lost forever.

Can Landry and Nickolai work together despite their distrust of each other to save the legend before more innocent lives are lost? Will they find the real treasure isn’t the gold, but something more valuable. . .true love and understanding?

Find Weaver’s Needle online at:

Amazon | ChristianBook | Goodreads | Kobo

Read the introduction of Weaver’s Needle below:

Quote from The Line Between: What did it mean that the divine could not only notice but seem delighted in me?

Book Review | The Line Between by Tosca Lee

It’s Throwback Thursday! Today I’m resharing my review of dystopian thriller The Line Between by Tosca Lee, because the sequel releases this month. A Line Between is a great story, and the sequel promises to be just as nail-biting.

It’s near-future North America. Wynter Roth has just escaped the pseudo-Christian cult she’s lived in for the last sixteen years. Disease is sweeping the land. And Wynter is afraid the cult leader might have been right … maybe the outsde world was all heading for hell.

Wynter is a character who is both brave and naive. She knows little of the ways of the modern world, because she was only five when she entered the cult’s compound and has rarely been permitted to leave. Her views of God and the world have been twisted by the cult leader, Marcus. Yet she has a strong sense of right and wrong. And she’s prepared to risk everything she knows for right … which means leaving the cult.

The story is fast-paced and disturbingly believable. That’s the key with dystopian fiction: twist something in our reality (in this case, infectious rapid onset dementia). Use that twist to destroy everything the characters know and rely on. Then see how they react.

The story flips back and forth between Wynter’s present and the events that led her to leaving the cult. This weaving provides added layers of complexity, and propel the present plot forward. It’s masterful writing. I challenge any fan of dystopian fiction to put this one down.

Recommended for fans of The Hunger Games, Divergent, and Maze Runner.

Thanks to Howard Books and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

About Tosca Lee

Author Photo: Tosca Lee

Tosca Lee is the award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of the House of Bathory duology (THE PROGENY and FIRSTBORN), ISCARIOT, THE LEGEND OF SHEBA, DEMON: A MEMOIR, HAVAH: THE STORY OF EVE, and the Books of Mortals series with New York Times bestseller Ted Dekker (FORBIDDEN, MORTAL, SOVEREIGN). A notorious night-owl, she loves watching TV, eating bacon, playing video games and football with her kids, and sending cheesy texts to her husband.

 

Find Tosca Lee online at:

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About The Line Between

In this frighteningly believable thriller from New York Times bestselling author Tosca Lee, an extinct disease re-emerges from the melting Alaskan permafrost to cause madness in its victims. For recent apocalyptic cult escapee Wynter Roth, it’s the end she’d always been told was coming.

When Wynter Roth is turned out of New Earth, a self-contained doomsday cult on the American prairie, she emerges into a world poised on the brink of madness as a mysterious outbreak of rapid early onset dementia spreads across the nation.

As Wynter struggles to start over in a world she’s been taught to regard as evil, she finds herself face-to-face with the apocalypse she’s feared all her life—until the night her sister shows up at her doorstep with a set of medical samples. That night, Wynter learns there’s something far more sinister at play and that these samples are key to understanding the disease.

Now, as the power grid fails and the nation descends into chaos, Wynter must find a way to get the samples to a lab in Colorado. Uncertain who to trust, she takes up with former military man Chase Miller, who has his own reasons for wanting to get close to the samples in her possession, and to Wynter herself.

Filled with action, conspiracy, romance, and questions of whom—and what—to believe, The Line Between is a high-octane story of survival and love in a world on the brink of madness.

You can find The Line Between online at:

Amazon | ChristianBook | Goodreads

You can read the introduction to The Line Between below:

And don’t forget to watch out for A Single Light, which releases this month! Here’s the book description from Amazon:

Six months after vanishing into an underground silo with sixty others, Wynter and Chase emerge to find the area abandoned. There is no sign of Noah and the rest of the group that was supposed to greet them when they emerged—the same people Wynter was counting on to help her locate the IV antibiotics her gravely ill friend, Julie, needs in order to live.

As the clock ticks down on Julie’s life, Wynter and Chase embark on a desperate search for medicine and answers. But what they find is not a nation on the cusp of recovery thanks to the promising new vaccine Wynter herself had a hand in creating, but one decimated by disease. What happened while they were underground?

With food and water in limited supply and their own survival in question, Chase and Wynter must venture further and further from the silo. Aided by an enigmatic mute named Otto, they come face-to-face with a society radically changed by global pandemic, where communities scrabble to survive under rogue leaders and cities are war zones. As hope fades by the hour and Wynter learns the terrible truth of the last six months, she is called upon once again to help save the nation she no longer recognizes—a place so dark she’s no longer sure it can even survive.

Click here to find The Line Between, A Single Light, and other great Christian fiction at my Amazon shop.

Cover image - No Ocean Too Wide by Carrie Turansky

Book Review | No Ocean Too Wide by Carrie Turansky

No Ocean Too Wide is about the British Home Children, and the issues surrounding sending British children to Canada. It is similar to the Tennessee Children’s Home Society scandal depicted in Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate and The Pink Bonnet by Liz Tolsma.

The underlying idea behind the stories is the assumption that the children are better off being adopted out to more affluent families. However, the issue with the British Home Children is that many of them weren’t adopted into loving homes, affluent or otherwise. Many of them were little more than slaves, bought for a few dollars.

As such, parts of the first quarter felt a little contrived.

Would Laura really do this? Would Katie do that? I wasn’t sure. But I knew those things had to happen for the story to get going, so I was prepared to look past a few things that didn’t necessarily make sense.

Katie, Grace, and Garth McAlister are placed into an orphanage after their mother falls ill and is admitted to hospital. Their older sister, Laura, is a lady’s maid for the Frasier family, so doesn’t hear about her family’s troubles in time. Andrew Frasier offers to help Laura, but experience has taught her not to trust rich men.

Andrew is asked to look into possible issues with the British Home Children scheme.

He is surprised to find his mother’s maid involved. He’s even more surprised by her claim that her siblings have been sent to Canada, and vows to help reunite her family. But the law is not on their side …

No Ocean Too Wide is the first novel in a trilogy about the McAlistair family and their fictional experiences as British Home Children. Yes, it’s fictional, but the scheme itself—and many of the events portrayed in the novel—are based on fact. As such, it’s an excellent piece of historical fiction, as well as being a strong Christian historical romance. Recommended.

Thanks to Multnomah and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

About Carrie Turansky

Carrie TuranskyBestselling Inspirational Romance Author Carrie Turansky writes historical and contemporary novels and novellas set in England and the US. She has won the ACFW Carol Award, the Holt Medallion, and the International Digital Award. Readers say her stories are: “Heartwarming and inspiring! I couldn’t put it down!” . . . “Touching love story. It captured me from the first page! Rich characters, beautifully written” . . . “My new favorite author!”

Find Carrie Turansky online at:

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About No Ocean Too Wide

Between the years of 1869 to 1939 more than 100,000 poor British children were sent across the ocean to Canada with the promise of a better life. Those who took them in to work as farm laborers or household servants were told they were orphans–but was that the truth?

After the tragic loss of their father, the McAlister family is living at the edge of the poorhouse in London in 1908, leaving their mother to scrape by for her three younger children, while oldest daughter, Laura, works on a large estate more than an hour away. When Edna McAlister falls gravely ill and is hospitalized, twins Katie and Garth and eight-year-old Grace are forced into an orphans’ home before Laura is notified about her family’s unfortunate turn of events in London. With hundreds of British children sent on ships to Canada, whether truly orphans or not, Laura knows she must act quickly. But finding her siblings and taking care of her family may cost her everything.

Andrew Fraser, a wealthy young British lawyer and heir to the estate where Laura is in service, discovers that this common practice of finding new homes for penniless children might not be all that it seems. Together Laura and Andrew form an unlikely partnership. Will they arrive in time? Will their friendship blossom into something more?

Inspired by true events, this moving novel follows Laura as she seeks to reunite her family and her siblings who, in their darkest hours, must cling to the words from Isaiah: “Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God”.

Find No Ocean Too Wide online at:

Amazon US | Amazon AU | ChristianBook | Goodreads

Book Review | One Last Thing by Nancy Rue

An Exceptional Tale of Contemporary Issues

Tara Faulkner is marrying Seth Grissom: her brother’s best friend, the son of their pastor, and the guy she’s loved for ten years. But they have a strange argument three weeks before the wedding, and when she returns to discuss it with Seth, she finds him doing something awful.

He promises he’ll change and never do it again, and she wants to believe him. After all, the alternative is cancelling the wedding. But when she finds he lied, she does just that—but he makes her promise not to tell anyone why. This leaves her dealing with all the fallout, not least two families blaming her for the cancellation.

One Last Thing is written entirely in first person point of view from Tara’s viewpoint. This normally only works for complex characters, and Tara wasn’t complex, at least not in the beginning. She was the perfect pampered Southern princess, and while she hasn’t lived an entirely sheltered life, her family is financially stable and she’s always been given the best of everything. She attends church with her family, but there was little indication she had any personal faith: something that’s normally a must in Christian fiction, especially Christian romance.

At first I was a little frustrated that Seth, a Christian man who worked for a mission organisation, was planning to marry a woman who had little or no personal faith of her own. But as the novel progressed, Tara began to search for God … and it explained why Seth was prepared to be “unequally yoked”.

The explanation was misogynistic or hypocritical or possibly both, but it worked. And it worked without making me feel as though my emotions were being manipulated.

That’s strong writing.

The more Tara digs into Seth’s issues, the more she finds out, and the more secrets she has to keep from her friends, her family, and from Seth’s family. The only person who has any sympathy for her is Seth’s younger sister—who’s seen as a troublemaker. She is helped in her troubled journey by a disparate group of ladies she meets while working in a local coffee shop—her first-ever job.

Tara slowly discovers Seth’s issues, and strangely, this allows us to move from repugnance to sympathy for his problems while still acknowledging Tara did the right thing. Seth acknowledges that he has to take responsibility for his own actions, especially when they have hurt others. This is as a positive thing.

I wish it didn’t, but it does, and One Last Thing does an excellent job in sensitively fictionalising a growing problem in society.

It’s not easy reading, and it’s not nice. But it is real. Unfortunately.

Thanks to Thomas Nelson and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review. You can find out more about Rebecca St James and Nancy Rue at their websites.

You can read the opening here:

The past has light and shadows we don't see without looking from a different perspective.

Book Review | The Art of Rivers by Janet W Ferguson

Artist Rivers Sullivan has the almost-perfect life …

Until her fiancé is gunned down by a drug addict just ten days before their wedding. A year later, she’s on St. Simons Island, Georgia, preparing to pack up and sell the Barlow family cottage and art gallery, which she inherited from Jordan.

Here she meets Jordan’s cousin, an ex-addict who tore Jordan’s family apart when Jordan’s younger sister died in Cooper’s care. Jordan’s family still blames Cooper for Susannah’s death, although Jordan had been trying to reconcile with Cooper before his death. Rivers meets Cooper and finds he works in the gallery and runs a ministry for addicts, Re-Claimed.

Rivers doesn’t want to have anything to do with addicts, past or present.

Jordan was murdered by an addict. His sister lost her life due to an addict’s carelessness. Her mother is an alcoholic. Addicts can’t be trusted. Yet she’s attracted to Cooper, to his faith, to his passion for art. Almost against her will, Rivers finds herself getting involved in the gallery, in Re-Claimed, and with Cooper. But someone seems to want Re-Claimed closed, and is prepared to go to great lengths to make that happen …

The Art of Rivers is an excellent example of self-published Christian fiction.

The writing is top quality—as good as any Christian novel I’ve read. The characters feel real, and their conflicts a natural outworking of their personalities. There was no feeling that the conflict was contrived, or that the author had manipulated the characters to build the required tension. Some novels I read have an almost paint-by-numbers approach to the plot and characters, which doesn’t make for an engaging read. The Art of Rivers had none of that, which was excellent.

The real strength is that The Art of Rivers is a novel with Christian characters doing their best to live a Christian life in a world full of sin.

This is something that’s often missing from the novels from the large mainstream Christian publishers (many of which are owned by non-Christian multinational media conglomerates). While I’m happy to read these “Christian-lite” novels that have good stories and none of the content I’d rather not fill my mind with, it’s great to have more serious Christian fiction that deals with real-world issues from a Christian perspective. Recommended.

The Art of Rivers by @JanetwFerguson is an excellent example of self-published Christian fiction, showing Christian characters doing their best to live a Christian life. #BookReview #ChristianRomance Share on X

Thanks to the author for providing a free ebook for review.

About Janet W Ferguson

Janet W FergusonJanet W. Ferguson grew up in Mississippi and received a degree in Banking and Finance from the University of Mississippi. She has served her church as a children’s minister and a youth volunteer. An avid reader, she worked as a librarian at a large public high school. Janet and her husband have two grown children, one really smart dog, and a few cats that allow them to share the space.

Click here to read my interview with Janet W Ferguson.

Find Janet W Ferguson online at:

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About The Art of Rivers

Rivers Sullivan bears both visible and invisible scars—those on her shoulder from a bullet wound and those on her heart from the loss of her fiancé during the same brutal attack. Not even her background as an art therapist can help her regain her faith in humanity. Still, she scrapes together the courage to travel to St. Simons Island to see the beach cottage and art gallery she’s inherited from her fiancé. When she stumbles upon recovering addicts running her gallery, she’s forced to reckon with her own healing.

After the tragic drowning of his cousin, James Cooper Knight spends his days trying to make up for his past mistakes. He not only dedicates his life to addiction counseling, but guilt drives him to the water, searching for others who’ve been caught unaware of the quickly rising tides of St. Simons. When he rescues a peculiar blond woman and her sketch pad from a sandbar, then delivers this same woman to his deceased grandmother’s properties, he knows things are about to get even more complicated.

Tragic circumstances draw Cooper and Rivers closer, but they fight their growing feelings. Though Cooper’s been sober for years, Rivers can’t imagine trusting her heart to someone in recovery, and he knows a relationship with her will only rip his family further apart. Distrust and guilt are only the first roadblocks they must overcome if they take a chance on love.

Find The Art of Rivers online at:

Amazon US | Amazon AU | Goodreads

It isn't us who are on trial, it is science itself. And I am confident we will win.

Book Review | A Daring Venture by Elizabeth Camden

It’s Throwback Thursday! Today I’m sharing my review of A Daring Venture by Elizabeth Camden. She is one of my favourite historical romance authors because I love the way she finds fascinating scraps of history to share about—like the fight for clean water in the growing cities of Golden Age America. It’s not the typical background to a romance novel, but it works!
This review first appeared at Australasian Christian Writers in June 2018.

Rosaline Werner lost both her parents to cholera when she was just ten years old. The loss changed her life, but eighteen years later she’s back in America, working as a biochemist fighting to eradicate waterborne diseases including typhoid. She’s convinced the answer is to chemically treat the city’s supply of drinking water with chlorine, but not everyone agrees.

Nicholas Drake is a plumber, and a commissioner of the State Water Board of New York, responsible for ensuring the citizens have access to clean water. But he can’t see that adding poison to water is the solution—he prefers the tried-and-true method of filtering the water.

It’s a great set-up: two people who want the same thing.

Two people with noble reasons. But two people who fundamentally disagree on the best process, to the point where their factions are fighting it out in court. It’s a plot that isn’t going to allow for compromise. Rosaline will win, or Nicholas will win. Unless Rosaline can convince Nicholas to change his mind …

It’s also a unique concept for a novel. Plumbing. Water. Dams. Chlorination. Filtration. Most of us in developed countries take safe drinking water for granted, and it’s hard to believe that it’s only been a little over a century since the idea was mooted, accepted, and popularised. Elizabeth Camden is known for taking little-known and intriguing historical factoids and turning them into compelling historical novels with plenty of romance and more than a little suspense.

The one possible fault with A Daring Venture is that while Elizabeth Camden’s earlier novels were definitely Christian, this (and the previous novel in this Empire State series, A Dangerous Legacy) do not have any overtly Christian content. But nor are they general market titles, with all that implies. Perhaps it’s that the faith element is woven in so subtly that it’s not noticeable.

And in some ways, it shouldn’t be. A Daring Venture isn’t a faith-based story. It’s the story of clean, disease-free water, and some of the people who helped change our world for the better by fighting for what was right. Which, if you think about it, is the outworking of the Christian faith.

A Daring Venture is an excellent novel with a unique premise.

Recommended for fans of historical fiction, especially romances and novels with a basis in historical fact. I hope there will be a sequel, because I want to see more of Nicholas and his growing family.

Thanks to Bethany House and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

About Elizabeth Camden

Elizabeth Camden is a research librarian at a small college in central Florida. Her novels have won the coveted RITA and Christy Awards. She has published several articles for academic publications and is the author of four nonfiction history books. Her ongoing fascination with history and love of literature have led her to write inspirational fiction. Elizabeth lives with her husband near Orlando, Florida.

Find Elizabeth Camden online at:

Website | Facebook

About A Daring Venture

As a biochemist in early 1900s New York, Doctor Rosalind Werner has dedicated her life to the crusade against waterborne diseases. She is at the forefront of a groundbreaking technology that will change the way water is delivered to every household in the city–but only if she can get people to believe in her work.

Newly appointed Commissioner of Water for New York, Nicholas Drake is highly skeptical of Rosalind and her team’s techniques. When a brewing court case throws him into direct confrontation with her, he is surprised by his reaction to the lovely scientist.

While Rosalind and Nick wage a private war against their own attraction, they stand firmly on opposite sides of a battle that will impact far more than just their own lives. As the controversy grows more public and inflammatory and Rosalind becomes the target of an unknown enemy, the odds stacked against these two rivals swiftly grow more insurmountable with every passing day.

You can find A Daring Venture online at:

Amazon | ChristianBook | Goodreads | Koorong

Read the introduction to A Daring Venture below:

Over the Line by Kelly Irvin

Book Review | Over the Line by Kelly Irvin

I really enjoyed Tell Her No Lies, Kelly Irvin’s first foray out of Amish into romantic suspense.

Over the Line? Not so much. The writing was excellent. There was an action-filled plot with plenty of suspense. There were two romances (although I was more interested in the secondary romance than the primary romance).

One of my problems was the sheer number of characters. There were a lot, and I found that confusing at times. But my main problem was the political focus. I don’t mind Christian fiction that debates current issues, but I want Christian fiction to focus on universal issues, not US-centric issues like gun control. It’s a deeply divisive political football, and I see nothing in the debate (from either side) that brings people closer to God—surely the purpose of Christian fiction.

But let’s get back to the actual story and the actual characters.

It was apparent early on that Gabriella and Eli had broken up because Gabriella thought she’d caught Eli being unfaithful. It was equally apparent that this is one of those conflicts that could have been solved in half a paragraph if Gabriella had been adult enough to listen to Eli’s explanation. In this, she behaved more like a rebellious Amish teenager than successful attorney-turned-chef.

Perhaps that’s what made the conflict so annoying: as an attorney, Gabriella was trained to consider both sides of an argument. Yet she didn’t.

Eli wasn’t any better. He was an odd mix of get-in-there-and-shoot-the-baddies and too-scared-to-confront-his-girlfriend. It was as though he was simply there to be Gabriella’s love interest … That’s why I found the secondary romance more interesting.

On the other hand, Natalie and Deacon were excellent characters. I would have liked to have seen more of them and to see their developing relationship. It has challenges, to be sure (as Natalie is a widowed paraplegic with two children), but I’d like to see how a couple overcomes those challenges.

I found the actual suspense side of the plot confusing, and I found it hard to divorce the plot from the wider politics of the situation. That affected my enjoyment. However, I’m sure Americans who live in border states will have a different view.

Thanks to Thomas Nelson and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

About Kelly Irvin

Author Photo: Kelly IrvinKelly Irvin is the bestselling author of the Every Amish Season and Amish of Bee County series. The Beekeeper’s Son received a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, who called it a “beautifully woven masterpiece.” The two-time Carol Award finalist is a  former newspaper reporter and retired public relations professional. Kelly lives in Texas with her husband, photographer Tim Irvin. They have two children, two grandchildren, and two cats. In her spare time, she likes to read books by her favorite authors.

Find Kelly Irvin online at:

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About Over the Line

“You have something we want. We have something you want.”

Gabriella has never forgiven her former fiancé, homicide detective Eli Cavazos, for breaking her heart. Then a man she’s never met shows up at her restaurant, a bullet in his chest and her brother’s name on his lips. Gabby soon realizes this man is connected to a powerful ring of criminals who know far too much about her.

Against her better judgment, Gabby turns to Eli for help in finding her brother. When she receives a cryptic text from her brother’s cell phone, she realizes she is in deep and may be dragging Eli down with her. With her brother nowhere to be found and pain from her past threatening to overwhelm her, Gabby wonders how she will make it through this unexpected quest unscathed—or alive.

Taking us into the heat of Laredo, Texas, the secrets of a gun-smuggling ring, and the tensions on both sides of the border, Over the Line will keep you guessing until the last page.

Find Over the Line online at:

Amazon | ChristianBook | Goodreads | Koboicon | Koorong

Quote from Send Down the Rain by Charles Martin

Book Review | Send Down the Rain by Charles Martin

It’s Throwback Thursday! Today I’m resharing my review of Send Down the Rain by Charles Martin. He’s one of my favourite male Christian fiction authors, with a real strength in structuring stories so I can’t predict what’s going to happen.

About Send Down the Rain

Allie is still recovering from the loss of her family’s beloved waterfront restaurant on Florida’s Gulf Coast when she loses her second husband to a terrifying highway accident. Devastated and losing hope, she shudders to contemplate the future—until a cherished person from her past returns.

Joseph has been adrift for many years, wounded in both body and spirit and unable to come to terms with the trauma of his Vietnam War experiences. Just as he resolves to abandon his search for peace and live alone at a remote cabin in the Carolina mountains, he discovers a mother and her two small children lost in the forest. A man of character and strength, he instinctively steps in to help them get back to their home in Florida. There he will return to his own hometown—and witness the accident that launches a bittersweet reunion with his childhood sweetheart, Allie.

When Joseph offers to help Allie rebuild her restaurant, it seems the flame may reignite—until a 45-year-old secret from the past begins to emerge, threatening to destroy all hope for their second chance at love.

In Send Down the Rain, Charles Martin proves himself to be a storyteller of great wisdom and compassion who bears witness to the dreams we cherish, the struggles we face, and the courage we must summon when life seems to threaten what we hold most dear.

Send Down the Rain is an unusual story in many ways.

It starts decades ago with two brothers the day their father moves out, then jumps forward to the present. The first part shows three different characters, and it wasn’t until about a quarter of the way through that it became clear who the main character was.

Joseph is a 63-year-old Vietnam war veteran who has been running for more years than seems possible. We get to know him only gradually, as the story bounces back and forth between his past and his present, highlighting his failures (and sometimes his successes), his weaknesses and sometimes his strengths. He’s a strong narrator because he is weak: he’s humble and unpretentious and focuses more on what he’s done wrong than what he’s done right.

I got to about the 90% point in this book and thought it was good, but it hadn’t reached the heights of The Mountain Between Us (now a major movie starring Kate Winslet and Idris Elba) or Long Way Gone (a modern retelling of the story of the Prodigal Son).

But by the time I finished Send Down the Rain I had changed my mind.

It’s at least as good as these, but the power builds up and up and only bites at the end. There isn’t an obvious Christian thread or an overt parallel with a Bible story (as there was in Long Way Gone). Send Down the Rain is more of an exploration of love, loyalty, and family, a story of sacrifice and second chances. And that pretty much sums up the gospel.

An outstanding novel of love and faithfulness, in Martin’s trademark understated yet compelling style. Recommended.

Thanks to Thomas Nelson and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

About Charles Martin

Author Photo: Charles MartinChristy and I married in 1993. If you include dating, I’ve known and loved her for more than half my life. She is and always will be the home for my heart. We have three boys. Charlie, John T. and Rives. Folks often ask me, which of my books do I like the best. You might as well line up my sons and ask me who I love the most.

My hobbies are bow hunting, working out (a blend of old school stuff and martial arts, called Fight Fit) and Tae Kwon Do. In October 2012 I earned my black belt but I’m still the least flexible person you’ve ever met. The guy that trains me, laughs everytime I start warming up. My boys are far better at Tae Kwon Do than I but I doubt they have as much fun – I get to do and watch. They just do.

I also like to write, but that’s another story.

You can find Charles Martin online at:

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You can find Send Down the Rain online at:

Amazon | ChristianBook | Goodreads

You can read the introduction to Send Down the Rain below:

We're all good. We're all bad. The hero in our own stories. The villain in someone else's.

Book Review | The Number of Love by Roseanna M White

Margot De Wilde escaped the German occupation in Belgium, and now she and her mother are living in London where Margot works in Room 40 of the Old Admiralty Building. She’s a codebreaker—one of the stars of the department, despite being the youngest cryptographer and the only female.

She has a unique brain, in that numbers seem to rearrange themselves into words and messages.

Drake Elton is a British spy disguised as a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy. He is half-Spanish so is the obvious choice to work as an undercover agent in neutral Spain. He finds himself back in London after a mission goes wrong. But the mission follows him to London and is now targeting him and those around him …

Including Margot

The whole concept of coding has always fascinated me, as I suspect it has fascinated Roseanna M White. I understand the basic principles of cyphers and codes, but I am clueless when it comes to the maths behind creating and (especially) cracking codes. That’s why I find a heroine like Margot De Wilde fascinating. She might be only a teenager, but she’s cleverer than most of the men working in her department and has gained their respect because of her skill.

While the research was generally excellent and well-integrated into the plot, there were a couple of anachronisms that threw me out of the story. Yes, rulers have used humans to provide intelligence on the opposing forces ever since Moses sent the twelve spies into Israel after the Hebrews escaped from Egypt. But that’s only been called HUMINT recently—it may have been human intelligence in 1917, but it certainly wasn’t HUMINT. SIGINT is equally problematic, as is hun (which should be capitalised, in the same way as american or canadian should be capitalised).

If you read Roseanna M White’s excellent Shadows Over England series, then you’ll recognise Margot De Wilde and her family from A Song Unheard. And if you’ve read The Cypher Ring series, then you’ll know Roseanna M White has a longstanding fascination with codes and codebreakers.

But don’t worry if you haven’t read them: The Number of Love is an excellent standalone novel that combines White’s love of codes with an excellent romantic suspense story set against the backdrop of World War I London.

The characters are fascinating, the writing is excellent, and the result is a unique page-turner.

Recommended for fans of historical fiction, and for those intrigued by movies such as Enigma or Hidden Figures. I’m looking forward to reading the next in the series.

Thanks to Bethany House and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

The Numbers of Love by @RoseannaMWhite is excellent. The characters are fascinating, the writing is excellent, and the result is a unique page-turner. #BookReview #ChristianFiction Share on X

About Roseanna M White

Roseanna M. White pens her novels beneath her Betsy Ross flag, with her Jane Austen action figure watching over her. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two children, editing and designing, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna has a slew of historical novels available, ranging from biblical fiction to American-set romances to her new British series. She lives with her family in West Virginia.

Find Roseanna M White online at:

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About The Number of Love

Three years into the Great War, England’s greatest asset is their intelligence network–field agents risking their lives to gather information, and codebreakers able to crack every German telegram. Margot De Wilde thrives in the environment of the secretive Room 40, where she spends her days deciphering intercepted messages. But when her world is turned upside down by an unexpected loss, for the first time in her life numbers aren’t enough.

Drake Elton returns wounded from the field, followed by an enemy who just won’t give up. He’s smitten quickly by the intelligent Margot, but how can he convince a girl who lives entirely in her mind that sometimes life’s answers lie in the heart?

Amid biological warfare, encrypted letters, and a German spy who wants to destroy not just them but others they love, Margot and Drake will have to work together to save themselves from the very secrets that brought them together.

You can find The Number of Love online at:

Amazon US | Amazon AU | ChristianBook | Goodreads | Koorong