Thursday, August 22, 2019

Dear Grandchild, This Is Me



I have three grandchildren that I treasure.  They often ask me questions about when I was born, what was on tv when I was a child and my oldest grandson was amazed that I was born close to when Godzilla just came out.

I was given the opportunity to review and share a book called Dear Grandchild, This Is Me.  I flipped through the pages and it made me take a trip down memory lane.  Where was I born?  Where did I live?  The book is one where you answer questions and tell your grandchild(ren) about who you are.

I will take my time filling out the pages. I won't give it to them until they are older.  It will be a gift for them in the future but a gift to me to relive the ups and downs of my life as I see it.

I received this free from Water Brook to review.

Monday, August 19, 2019

The Healing Jar

What a wonderful conclusion to this series by Wanda Brunstetter!  I enjoyed getting to know each of the characters in these collections.  


Lenore wanted nothing more than to be a wife and mother.  When she met Jesse she felt that her prayers were answered.  But were they?

 The prayer jars had valuable lessons enclosed inside.  Lenore, Michelle, and Sara had much to learn from them.  Each prayer inside guided their paths.  What a previous gift that was given to them.  The jars were hidden but they were in places that they could be found.  Three jars: three young women who needed to find them.

I love the idea of having a prayer jar.  I also think it would be wonderful to have a blessings jar.  

Lenore was inpatient with GOD's timing.  I think we all have been there at some point in our lives.  I was divorced and felt cheated of having a happy home and a husband.  But GOD was telling me to wait...I didn't listen.  I dated and tried to make the relationship work but it wasn't GOD's plans for me.  When I least expected it, I met my husband.  The man GOD wanted for me.  I couldn't be happier.  


The Healing Jar (Book 3)

{August 2019}
What if you have waited to find love only to be rejected when it finally comes?
Lenore Lapp is an Amish schoolteacher in her late twenties living with grandparents to help out. She thought love had passed her by until she met Jesse Smucker, a widower with a baby daughter. Lenore quickly falls in love with them both and accepts Jesse’s proposal of marriage, but Jesse breaks off their engagement when he realizes he can’t marry only for convenience.
Resigned to living single, Lenore throws herself into caring for her elders. While working in her grandmother’s garden one day, she digs up an old jar. Will Lenore find healing for her broken heart and solve long-buried family secrets by reading the notes contained inside?

Saturday, August 17, 2019

Meghan's Choice

We all make choices everyday of our lives.  Some are menial.  Some are life changing.  What would have happened if you turned left instead of right?  What if I didn't take that job?


Meghan had some growing up to do.  She decided to go to New Boston to teach.  Did she really think this through? Would this be a good choice for her?  

Meghan had choices to make in her personal, professional and spiritual life.  This applies to each one of us.  Our futures are based on our choices.  In order to make these important decisions we need to listen to what GOD has to say.  

 “Be still, and know that I am God" Psalm 46:10

Duncan carried such a heavy load.  What would it take to heal?


“Cast your burden on the Lord, and He shall sustain you; He shall never permit the righteous to be moved” (Psalm 55:22).

I really enjoyed this book.  I was happy with "Meghan's Choice"!!

I received this free from Celebrate Lit to review.

About the Book

Book: Meghan’s Choice
Author: Donna L. H. Smith
Genre: Christian Historical Western Romance
Release Date: November, 2017
Meghan's Choice COVER FinalistMeghan Gallagher complies with her father’s demand that she work on her own for a year by choosing to tutor eight children in a wild Kansas railroad town. But she had no idea just how wild it was until she was rescued by a local dance hall the day she arrived, and soon after hit by a stray bullet. In short order, she meets a dark, handsome cowboy and a wholesome, attractive doctor who both vie for her heart. As things heat up around town, Meghan’s love life catches fire as well. Is she scandalous to allow both men to court her at the same time? And—how close a relationship with God does Meghan want? Will she draw near?
Meghan’s Choice (pre-published) was named a semi-finalist in the 2014 Operation First Novel by Jerry B. Jenkins and an honorable mention for the Golden leaf Award in 2015. Since publication, Meghan’s Choice was a Selah Award finalist and also in the Will Rogers Medallion Award.
Published in connection with Hartline Literary Agency, serving the Christian book community. Visit us at www.hartlineliterary.com.

Click here to grab your copy.

About the Author

Donna SmithDonna L.H. Smith is a Kansas prairie girl transplanted to Lancaster County, PA. She is a graduate of Christian Writer’s Guild Craftsman program and holds two college degrees, both B.S. and M.A. in Mass Communication. She’s been married to a wonderful man named Kirby for thirty years. Her debut novel, Meghan’s Choice, made the finals of both the Selah and Will Rogers Medallion Awards. Rose’s Redemption, the sequel, was just released. She blogs, speaks at workshops and retreats and although she is at an age where many begin slowing down, she wouldn’t think of it. Recently, she took on the role of Managing Editor of Almost an Author.com, and serves as ACFW (American Christian Fiction Writers) Mid-Atlantic Zone Director. She is also a member of AWSA’s Protégé program (Advanced Writers & Speaker’s Association).

More from Donna

Back in 2012, I wrote “Zorro” stories for Fan Fiction. I had an awful lot of fun with them, and people seemed to really like them. So, the thought came, what could I write for ‘real?’ I contemplated, prayed, and after a couple weeks or so, an idea came floating across my brain.
“Gunfight at Hyde Park.” Huh? I thought about it, and realized it was an obscure history lesson from my hometown in Kansas. I had Google it to get the details. I thought, well, I’m not gonna write a Christian romance novel just about a series of gunfights that killed and wounded more people than the OK Corral.
But I did think that the beginning of the gunfights could be the climax of the story.
Now, who should my heroine be? And the hero?
I started with that and took Christian Writer’s Guild’s Craftsman and the novel was completed in 2013—but only published in late 2017.
I’m proud of Meghan’s Choice. Pre-published it made the semi-finals of the last Operation 1st Novel that CWG held and placed in a couple of smaller contests. Last year, it made the finals of the prestigious Selah Awards for published books through the BRMCWC, and the finals of the Will Rogers Medallion Award.
My hope is that you’ll enjoy reading it as much as I loved writing it.

Blog Stops

Moments, August 14
Godly Book Reviews, August 15
Emily Yager, August 16
Vicky Sluiter, August 18
mpbooks, August 20
Pause for Tales, August 21
Older & Smarter?, August 22
Texas Book-aholic, August 23
A Reader’s Brain, August 24
janicesbookreviews, August 25

Giveaway

To celebrate her tour, Donna is giving away the grand prize of a copy of her book!!
Be sure to comment on the blog stops for nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter.

Saturday, August 3, 2019

Jessie and James

A cute story about how life doesn't always go as planned.  Jessie was determined to live her life the way she wanted to and not have any man tell her what she can or can not do.  James was going to prove he was worthy to his father.  He didn't expect to meet anyone like Jessie.


Is our worth based on a deed?  If we make a lot of money or come in first in a competition, are we worth more than the person who lost?  I think not.  GOD treasures each one of us not because we are faster, richer or even cuter than someone else.  
Jessie and James felt they had to prove something to be worthy.  They both had a valuable lesson to learn.  

I enjoyed getting to know Jessie.  She had so much compassion for others.  She had to learn to be a little more compassionate to herself.

I received this for free from Celebrate Lit to review.  


About the Book

Book: Jessie and James
Author: Jennifer Beckstrand
Genre: Western Historical Inspirational Romance
Release Date: July 24, 2019
BECKSTRAND_Jessie _JamesJessie Madsen has her hands full helping her parents run their small farm and boarding house while every fortune-seeker in the country seems to be flocking to her small town in search of gold. It’s bad enough that claim jumpers won’t quit trespassing on her property, but geologist James Kelsey, mildly intriguing and surprisingly handsome for an Easterner, seems more interested in her than the mining business. Jessie is certain she doesn’t have the time or the need for a man, and after getting her heart broken, she has resolved never to fall for an outsider again. Add stolen cash, a fast-talking con man, and a pair of bandits, and Jessie is indeed up to her eyeballs in trouble. Will she soften her rock-hard exterior and let the geologist discover the hidden treasure in her heart?

Click here to grab your copy!

About the Author

Jennifer beckstrandJennifer Beckstrand is the two-time RITA-nominated, #1 Amazon bestselling Amish romance author of The Matchmakers of Huckleberry Hillseries, The Honeybee Sistersseries, and The Petersheim Brothersseries for Kensington Books.Huckleberry Summer and Home on Huckleberry Hill were bothnominated for the coveted RITA® Award from Romance Writers of America. Jennifer has always been drawn to the strong faith and the enduring family ties of the Plain people and loves writing about the antics of Anna and Felty Helmuth, the Honeybee sisters’ aendiBitsy, and Alfie and Benji Petersheim. Jennifer has written twenty-one Amish romances, a historical Western, and the nonfiction book,Big Ideas. She and her husband have been married for thirty-four years, and she has six children and seven adorable grandchildren, whom she spoils rotten.

More from Jennifer

Jessie and James is my first published Western historical novel, and I couldn’t be more excited. The first book I ever wrote was a historical Western, and I’ve been wanting to write another one for ten years. (That first Western is still hanging around my house somewhere. I might decide to publish it next. J) For my research, I traveled to a real mining town about two hours from my house. Yes, it really is named Eureka, and it was a boomtown in the 1880s, the period in which my book is set. I met an old-timer in Eureka who told me some fascinating stories about mining then and now.
Did you know that you may own the ground your house sits on, but you only own it to sixty feet deep? So a mining company can come in and dig a mine right under your house, and it’s perfectly legal. Many mines were dug straight down or in any direction that would get them to ore faster. In the 1880s in Eureka, often they’d dig straight down using only picks, shovels, and dynamite. A plumb bob was utilized to make sure their tunnels were straight up and down. They usually dug down 600 feet then drifted horizontally a couple hundred feet, then dug down again. Some mines went deeper than 1800 feet. Nowadays, there aren’t many mines that deep. They’re more dangerous, so they’re too expensive to insure.
In Jessie and James, James is an ex-cowboy turned geologist looking for gold. Jessie is a feisty, independent woman who runs a boarding house with her parents and thinks Eureka needs a little more fire-and-brimstone preaching to keep the incorrigible miners in line. Jessie doesn’t want anything to do with a gold digger, and she’s willing to use her shotgun to run James off. But James doesn’t scare that easy, especially when the woman on the other end of that shotgun might turn out to be the love of his life.
Jessie and James is full of shotguns, bandits, and heart-stopping romance. Don’t miss it!

Blog Stops

Betti Mace, August 2
Splashesofjoy, August 6
Bigreadersite, August 9
A Reader’s Brain, August 10
Blessed & Bookish, August 10
Texas Book-aholic, August 11
janicesbookreviews, August 14

Giveaway

To celebrate her tour, Jennifer is giving away a $10 Amazon gift card to two winners!!
Be sure to comment on the blog stops for nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter. https://promosimple.com/ps/e57b/jessie-and-james-celebration-tour-giveaway

Return to Love's Promise

No.  It can't end there.  There has to be another page.  This is how I felt when I finished this latest addition to the The Amish Bonnet...