The power of fiction, the beauty of words, and the God who made us to wield them for His glory.

Best of 2020 – Emoji Files Part III: The WOW Awards

Hello again, reader friends! Welcome to Part III of my annual Emoji Files celebrating my best reads of 2020. If you’ve missed either of the previous posts to date, make sure you check out The Swoony Awards and Got Me in the Feels.

Normally, the WOW Awards go to those books that kept me riveted with high-intensity action, pumping adrenaline, plot twists, or just some good old-fashioned suspense. And most of the books in this list did exactly that. This year, however, I’ve included two books that don’t necessary meet that criteria: Lu. by Beth Troy and Heartless by Tamara Leigh, both of which WOWed me in their own ways…

Read More »

Best of 2020 – Emoji Files Part II: Got Me in the Feels

Yesterday I began posting my annual best-of series of posts, which I’ve dubbed The Emoji Files, since I group my favourite reads of the year according to the emotional impact they had on me. It all started yesterday with the Swoony Awards, so if you missed that, make sure you check it out here.

Today, I’m giving you the reads that ‘Got Me in the Feels’. These are the books that made me really emotionally invested in the story, sometimes to the point of tears (sobs, in at least one case!). Stories of consequences and difficult decisions, stories of loss, stories of transformation, and stories that just plain had my emotions in a tangle!

Read More »

Best of 2020 – Emoji Files Part I: The Swoony Awards (and Top Ten Tuesday)

Happy Tuesday, reader friends, and welcome to the final Top Ten Tuesday for 2020 thanks to That Artsy Reader Girl. As always, this week’s topic looks back at our favourite books for the year. I’m also kicking off my annual Emoji Files awards where I break down my favourite reads for the year into the following categories:

The Swoony Awards – all the romance (le sigh!)
Got Me In The Feels – the books that reached in and plucked my heartstrings
The WOW Awards – suspense, thrills, high stakes, and surprises
Take Me Away . . . – fully immersive reads that took me to times and places far away
The LOL Awards – from light-hearted to bust-a-gut humour

Read More »

The London Restoration (Rachel McMillan) – Review

The secrets that might save a nation could shatter a marriage.

Madly in love, Diana Foyle and Brent Somerville married in London as the bombs of World War II dropped on their beloved city. Without time for a honeymoon, the couple spent the next four years apart. Diana, an architectural historian, took a top-secret intelligence post at Bletchley Park. Brent, a professor of theology at King’s College, believed his wife was working for the Foreign Office as a translator when he was injured in an attack on the European front.

Now that the war is over, the Somervilles’ long-anticipated reunion is strained by everything they cannot speak of. Diana’s extensive knowledge of London’s churches could help bring down a Russian agent named Eternity. She’s eager to help MI6 thwart Communist efforts to start a new war, but because of the Official Secrets Act, Diana can’t tell Brent the truth about her work.

Read More »

Top Ten Tuesday – Summer TBR 2020/2021

Happy Tuesday, reading friends. It’s time for another Top Ten Tuesday post, thanks to That Artsy Reader Girl. This week we’re sharing our winter (or in my case, summer) TBRs, and I’ve loved looking through my book lists to see what’s coming up in the next few months. It looks like I’ll be enjoying quite a few historicals, but I’ve managed to get a few contemporaries in there as well, including the first book in an exciting new thriller series! Can’t wait to dive into these.

Read More »

Top Ten Tuesday – Ten Christmas Romances

Happy Tuesday, reading friends. It’s time for another Top Ten Tuesday post, thanks to That Artsy Reader Girl. This week is a Christmas/Holiday freebie, so I’m listing ten Christmas romances I’ve got my eye on. All these romances (with the exception of Mimi Matthews’ A Holiday by Gaslight) are 2020 releases, and I’ve already read three of them (Christmas in Three Quarter Time, The Holiday Husband, and A Holiday by Gaslight), but I’m hoping to make my way through a few more before we reach Christmas!

Read More »

The Heart of a Warrior (Angela K. Couch) – Review

The Man She Fears Is Her Only Chance For Survival . . .

All Christina Astle wants is to reach Oregon before her baby is born, but the wagon train is attacked, and her husband killed, stranding her in a mountain labyrinth. Raised in the East, within civilization’s embrace, survival is not a skill she’s learned. Neither is evading the lone warrior dogging her trail.

Disgusted by the greed and cruelty of men like his white father, Towan has turned to the simpler existence of his mother’s tribal people. He is not prepared for the fiery woman who threatens to upturn his entire life … and his heart.

Read More »

Gentleman Jim (Mimi Matthews) – Review

She Couldn’t Forget…

Wealthy squire’s daughter Margaret Honeywell was always meant to marry her neighbor, Frederick Burton-Smythe, but it’s bastard-born Nicholas Seaton who has her heart. Raised alongside her on her father’s estate, Nicholas is the rumored son of notorious highwayman Gentleman Jim. When Fred frames him for theft, Nicholas escapes into the night, vowing to find his legendary sire. But Nicholas never returns. A decade later, he’s long been presumed dead.

He Wouldn’t Forgive…

After years spent on the continent, John Beresford, Viscount St. Clare has finally come home to England. Tall, blond, and dangerous, he’s on a mission to restore his family’s honor…

Read More »