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

The Lady in Residence (Allison Pittman) – Review + Giveaway

Can a Legacy of Sadness be Broken at the Menger Hotel?

Young widow Hedda Krause checks into the Menger Hotel in 1915 with a trunk full of dresses, a case full of jewels, and enough cash to pay for a two-month stay, which she hopes will be long enough to meet, charm, and attach herself to a new, rich husband. Her plans are derailed when a ghostly apparition lures her into a long, dark hallway, and Hedda returns to her room to find her precious jewelry has been stolen. She falls immediately under a cloud of suspicion with her haunting tale, but true ghost enthusiasts bring her expensive pieces of jewelry in an attempt to lure the ghost to appear again.

In 2017, Dini Blackstone is a fifth-generation magician, who performs at private parties, but she also gives ghost walk tours, narrating the more tragic historical events of San Antonio with familial affection. Above all, her favorite is the tale of Hedda Krause who, in Dini’s estimation, succeeded in perpetrating the world’s longest con, dying old and wealthy from her ghost story. But then Dini meets Quinn Carmichael, great-great-grandson of the detective who originally investigated Hedda’s case, who’s come to the Alamo City with a box full of clues that might lead to Hedda’s exoneration. Can Dini see another side of the story that is worthy of God’s grace?

Read More »

The Mulberry Leaf Whispers (Linda Thompson) – Review + Giveaway

A WWII Japanese naval officer. The teenage daughter of a legendary Christian samurai. Three centuries separate them, but a crucial question binds their destinies together.

Which lives have value?

In the highly anticipated sequel to her award-winning debut novel, The Plum Blooms in Winter, Linda Thompson provides a riveting story inspired by true events.

Read More »

Best of 2020 – Emoji Files, Part IV: Take Me Away

Welcome back, reader friends! It’s time for Part IV of my annual Emoji Files celebrating my best reads of 2020. If you’ve missed my previous posts for 2020, make sure you check out The Swoony Awards, Got Me in the Feels, and The WOW Awards.

The Take Me Away Awards go to those books that were truly immersive reads, carrying me away to different times and places with authentic historical, sensory, and cultural details and introducing me to some fantastic and intriguing characters who inhabit those worlds. Through these stories I’ve travelled all over the world and beyond—an experience that has had extra significance in 2020!

Read More »

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 »

Set the Stars Alight (Amanda Dykes) – Review

Lucy Clairmont’s family treasured the magic of the past, and her childhood fascination with stories of the high seas led her to become a marine archaeologist. But when tragedy strikes, it’s Dashel, an American forensic astronomer, and his knowledge of the stars that may help her unearth the truth behind the puzzle she’s discovered in her family home.

Two hundred years earlier, the seeds of love are sown between a boy and a girl who spend their days playing in a secret sea cave, while the privileged young son of the estate looks on, wishing to join. As the children grow and war leads to unthinkable heartbreak, a story of love, betrayal, sacrifice, and redemption unfolds, held secret by the passage of time.

Read More »

First Line Friday – Set the Stars Alight (Amanda Dykes)

Happy Friday, book lovers, and welcome to First Line Friday hosted by Hoarding Books. Friends, I have just picked up Amanda Dykes’ upcoming release Set the Stars Alight, and I am already hooked. Her writing is GORGEOUS, and she spins her stories with all the delicacy and finesse of a master web-weaver. If you haven’t read her yet, make sure you get your hands on one of her books!

Read More »

The Book of Lost Friends (Lisa Wingate) – Review

Bestselling author Lisa Wingate brings to life startling stories from actual “Lost Friends” advertisements that appeared in Southern newspapers after the Civil War, as newly freed slaves desperately searched for loved ones who had been sold away.

Louisiana, 1875: In the tumultuous era of Reconstruction, three young women set off as unwilling companions on a perilous quest: Hannie, a freed slave; Lavinia, the pampered heir to a now destitute plantation; and Juneau Jane, Lavinia’s Creole half sister. Each carries private wounds and powerful secrets as they head for Texas, following roads rife with vigilantes and soldiers still fighting a war lost a decade before. For Lavinia and Juneau Jane, the journey is one of stolen inheritance and financial desperation, but for Hannie, torn from her mother and siblings before slavery’s end, the pilgrimage west reignites an agonizing question: Could her long-lost family still be out there?

Read More »