Debut Author Georgiana Daniels and Table For One
July 30, 2008
It’s always exciting when a friend gets that first contract. Georgiana Daniels is an online buddy I got to meet in person at last year’s ACFW conference. Her first book, Table for One, has just released in paperback, and I got a chance to read it.
BACK COVER:
Successful stockbroker Lucy Brocklehurst hasn’t had a date in four years. In a town where the ratio of single women to men is 7:1, she’s determined to wait on God for the perfect mate–as long as it’s the hot new youth pastor at her church.
Lucy will do anything to get his attention, including volunteering for the youth group. Through a series of misadventures on the teen outings, Lucy finds herself falling in love with a kindhearted chaperone named Edgar Flowers. But when their relationship grows serious, Lucy discovers the lengths his recently widowed mother will go to in order to keep them apart. What starts out as harmless interference turns into an all out tug of war, with Edgar as the prize!
Will Lucy crumble under the scrutiny of her would-be mother-in-law? Or can Lucy and Edgar’s budding romance survive the schemes of his meddling mom?
AUTHOR BIO:
Georgiana Daniels is the wife of a super-generous husband, and the mother of a teen and two tots. After graduating with a degree in public relations, she spent several years in the business world, but now has the privilege of staying home and working on the stories she loves. Table for One is her first book. When not writing, she spends her time burning up miles on the treadmill, blogging, and participating in ACFW and RWA.
Sally Says: Table for One was a lot of fun with the right mix of humor and real-life drama. Lucy Brocklehurst, gotta love that name, is a lovable heroine who’s trying so hard to do what’s right — and find the right man at the same time. Throughout the book, she’s getting into embarrassing scrapes, but she’s a tough girl who’s smart enough to realize when she’s made the wrong choice. Poor thing–we just wish that sometimes she’d know the right way to make up for those wrongs! 
There was a time or two when I thought another character was too hard on Lucy, but other than that the book is a great story about life as a single Christian female. Lucy’s a brave woman who takes on more than I probably would, and as I finished the book, I found myself hoping that everything would turn out just fine for her, almost as if she were real.
If you’re a fan of chick lit or romance, you’ll enjoy Table for One. Congrats on your first book, Georgiana, and may there be many more!
Click here or here if you’d like information on how to purchase the book. For any of you who like e-books, Table for One is available in that format. And check out Georgiana’s blog where she’s posting most days of the week.
The Falcon and The Sparrow by M.L. Tyndall
July 29, 2008
This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
(Barbour Publishing, Inc – August 1, 2008)
by
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
M. L. (MARYLU) TYNDALL grew up on the beaches of South Florida loving the sea and the warm tropics. But despite the beauty around her, she always felt an ache in her soul–a longing for something more.
After college, she married and moved to California where she had two children and settled into a job at a local computer company. Although she had done everything the world expected, she was still miserable. She hated her job and her marriage was falling apart.
Still searching for purpose, adventure and true love, she spent her late twenties and early thirties doing all the things the world told her would make her happy, and after years, her children suffered, her second marriage suffered, and she was still miserable.
One day, she picked up her old Bible, dusted it off, and began to read. Somewhere in the middle, God opened her hardened heart to see that He was real, that He still loved her, and that He had a purpose for her life, if she’d only give her heart to Him completely.
Her current releases in the Legacy of The Kings Pirates series include:The Restitution, The Reliance, and The Redemption
ABOUT THE BOOK
When Mademoiselle Dominique Dawson sets foot on the soil of her beloved homeland, England, she feels neither the happiness nor the excitement she expected upon her
return to the place of her birth. Alone for the first time in her life, without family, without friends, without protection, she now faces a far more frightening prospect, for she has come to the country she loves as an enemy-a spy for Napoleon.
Forced to betray England or never see her only brother alive again, Dominique has accepted a position as governess to the son of Admiral Chase Randal, a harsh man, still bitter over the loss of his wife. Will Dominique find the strength she needs through God to follow through with the plan to rescue her brother? Will Chase find comfort for his bitter heart in God’s arms and be able to love again?
And what new deceptions will they both find in France when they arrive to carry out their plan?
If you would like to read an excerpt of The Falcon And The Sparrow, go HERE
Sally Says: I hate having to review a book before I’m completely done with it, but we’re in the middle of VBS and I’m trying to get ready for a baby and finish with three editing clients all in one week so I haven’t finished The Falcon and the Sparrow yet.
But so far I can say it’s a fun read, as MaryLu’s book’s tend to be. She’s taken that tried-and-true story of the governess and the widowed father and given it a new twist–the governess is a spy. There’s humor and romance, and so far the book has been a light but very fun read. If you like romance and the regency period (I think that’s the correct setting), then go get The Falcon and the Sparrow.
A Review of Painted Dresses by Patricia Hickman
July 25, 2008
This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
(WaterBrook Press – July 15, 2008)
by
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Patricia Hickman is an award-winning author of fiction and non-fiction, whose work has been praised by critics and readers alike.
Patricia Hickman began writing many years ago after an invitation to join a writer’s critique group. It was headed up by best-selling author Dr. Gilbert Morris, a pioneer in Christian fiction who has written many best selling titles. The group eventually came to be called the “Nubbing Chits”. All four members of the original “Chits” have gone on to become award-winning and best selling novelists (good fruit, Gil!).
Patty signed her first multi-book contract with Bethany House Publishers. After she wrote several novels “for the market”, she assessed her writer’s life and decided she would follow the leanings of her heart. She says, “It had to be God leading me into the next work which wound up being my first break-out book, Katrina’s Wings. I had never read a southern mainstream novel, yet I knew that one lived in my head, begging to be brought out and developed.” She wanted to create deeper stories that broke away from convention and formula. From her own journey in life, she created a world based upon her hometown in the 70’s, including Earthly Vows and Whisper Town from the Millwood Hollow Series.
Patty and her husband, Randy, have planted two churches in North Carolina. Her husband pastors Family Christian Center, located in Huntersville. The Hickmans have three children, two on earth and one in heaven. Their daughter, Jessi, was involved in a fatal automobile accident in 2001. Through her writing and speaking, Patty seeks to offer help, hope and encouragement to those who walk the daily road of loss and grief.
ABOUT THE BOOK
In this story of sisterhood and unexpected paths, Gaylen Syler-Boatwright flees her unraveling marriage to take refuge in a mountain cottage owned by her deceased aunt. Burdened with looking after her adult sister, Delia, she is shocked to find a trail of family secrets hidden within her aunt’s odd collection of framed, painted dresses. With Delia, who attracts trouble as a daily occupation, Gaylen embarks on a road trip that throws the unlikely pair together on a journey to painful understanding and delightful revelations.
Steeped in Hickman’s trademark humor, her spare writing voice, and the bittersweet pathos of the South, Painted Dresses powerfully captures a woman’s desperate longing to uncover a hidden, broken life and discover the liberty of living authentically, even when the things exposed are shrouded in shame.
If you would like to read the first chapter, go HERE
Sally Says: The book’s back cover says that Patricia Hickman writes with the bittersweet pathos of the South, and that could not be more true in Painted Dresses. If you’re a big fan of Southern fiction, you will probably love this book.
I am not a big fan of Southern fiction. Those novels tend to be hit-or-miss for me. And this book, to me, did miss.
I know this is going to be one of those reviews that will be largely based on preference. I have to say that Patricia is an excellent writer. There were no writing techniques that bothered me in this book. It was all taste.
First, there are a lot of characters, and I had a hard time figuring out all the family. Some of them I never did get straight, but fortunately that didn’t turn out to be a big deal. Second, many of the characters were rather crude, unpolished. I’m not talking manners or etiquette — rather they sometimes edged on coming across as vulgar and uncouth. (Sheesh, I sound so snobbish here, I know.) Along with this, the book was a bit edgy for my tastes. There were some brief scenes that gave me too much info.
Lastly, the secret of the painted dresses is not a pretty one. There have been other books written on this topic (I won’t give it away for those of you who decide to read it), books I’ve read and enjoyed and found tasteful, but this one was just a bit too graphic, a bit too much. I found it to be almost depressing the closer I came to the end.
So to sum it up — aren’t you glad? — if you enjoy Southern fiction, you’ll love it. Great writing, a lot of realism. If you’re a bit queasy about certain topics, this may not be your cup of tea.
A Review of Robin Jones Gunn’s Latest Sisterchick Book
July 14, 2008
This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
Sisterchick Go Brit
Multnomah Publishers (May 20, 2008)
by
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Robin grew up in Orange County, California and has lived in all kinds of interesting places, including Reno and Hawaii.
Robin’s first novel was published in 1988, and she has continued to write between two to five books a year. Her 63 published books include 47 novels, all of which are still in print. Sales of her popular Christy Miller Series, Glenbrooke Series and Sisterchicks Series, including Sisterchicks in Gondolas and the new Katie Weldon Series including Peculiar Treasures all of which are approaching four million copies sold, with translations in nine languages.
Robin’s passion for storytelling and travel are evident in all her books, especially the Sisterchicks novels, and she has received thousands of letters from readers around the world who have come to know Christ through her writing. She sees this as her dream come true. Her novels are traveling to foreign lands and her characters are doing what she always longed to do; telling people about God’s love.
She and her husband currently live near Portland, Oregon and have been married for 30 years. They spent their first 22 years of marriage working together in youth ministry, and enjoying life with their son and daughter who are now both grown.
As a frequent speaker at local and international events, one of Robin’s favorite topics is how God is the Relentless Lover and we are His first love. She delights in telling stories of how God uses fiction to change lives.
Robin is the recipient of the Christy Award, the Mt. Hermon Pacesetter Award, the Sherwood E. Wirt Award and is a Gold Medallion Finalist. She also serves on the Board of Directors for Media Associates International and the Board of Directors for Jerry Jenkins’ Christian Writers’ Guild.
ABOUT THE BOOK
SISTERCHICK® n: a friend who shares the deepest wonders of your heart, loves you like a sister, and provides a reality check when you’re being a brat.
Two midlife mamas hop over to jolly ole England and encounter so much more than the usual tourist stops. Liz does have a bit of a childhood crush on Big Ben, and she has hoped to “meet” him ever since her fifteenth birthday. Kellie dreams of starting an interior design business and figures Liz needs to be a part of that equation–a calculation that hasn’t added up for Liz yet.
Nothing on the excursion goes the way these two friends had envisioned. They start with a village pancake race and end up being held for questioning on The Underground. Kellie and Liz take a wild tour through the land of C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien and then find themselves swept up, up, and away in a hot air balloon over the Cotswalds. London beckons with the Tower of London, Windsor Castle, shopping at Portabella Road in Knotting Hill, and of course, reservations at the Ritz for a posh high tea.
A few detours along the way and the possibility of being lost in a London fog of wonderment aren’t enough to stop these two Sisterchicks! Each step of their regal journey is lined with evidence of God’s gracious compassion, and both come to realize that God knows their every wish. He is the One who planted every dream in their hearts.
And, oh, what a surprise awaits them when they return home!
To read the first chapter, go HERE
“Robin has done it again! You and your Sisterchicks will love taking this new adventure together!”
- Karen Kingsbury, New York Times best-selling author of Between Sundays and Ever After
“My only complaint about Robin’s latest is that now I want to hop a plane to England! But combine a cup of Earl Grey tea and this charming story and you’re halfway there. Another delightful tale about women helping women to live their lives to the fullest.”
- Melody Carlson, author of These Boots Weren’t Made for Walking and A Mile in My Flip-Flops
“Sisterchicks in Gondolas is a true delight. The characters shine, and evocative language will make any reader want to visit Venice. Biblical truths are portrayed simply, yet will touch hearts and lives with their realistic application.”
- Romantic Times magazine
Sally Says: The first Sisterchick book I read was Sisterchicks Do the Hula, and when I finished it felt like I’d taken a relaxing trip to Hawaii. it was wonderful!
I decided to read the first one next, Sisterchicks on the Loose, and then read the one set in Mexico, but I missed the next few titles. So getting a chance to get back into the Sisterchicks book on their trip to England sounded fun.
And overall, the book was enjoyable. To me this book, especially the first half, read more like travel writing than a novel because the plot really didn’t seem to show up until late in the book and the characters didn’t seem well developed. But England has always appealed to me as a place to visit, so I enjoyed reading about the tourists sights and some of the unusual things the two characters discovered. If I were ever to go to England, I know I’d pull some of my stops right from this book.
This isn’t the best Sisterchicks book I’ve read, but I did enjoy it. If you’re a big fan of all things English and like travel writing, you’ll find Sisterchicks Go Brit to be a lot of fun.
A Review of Wind River by Tom Morrisey
July 10, 2008
This week, the
Christian Fiction Blog Alliance
is introducing
Wind River
(Bethany House July 1, 2008)
by
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Tom Morrisey is a mountaineer, aviator, shipwreck diver, and explorer, who holds a Full Cave certification from the National Speleological Society – Cave Diving Section.
He has launched, edited or contributed to numerous national publications and is an award-winning adventure-travel writer. A popular speaker, he is also active in both evangelism and the arts. Morrisey earned an MFA in creative writing from Bowling Green State University, and his fiction has been featured in numerous anthologies and magazines.
His first novel, Yucatan Deep (Zondervan, 2002) was a finalist for the Christy award, and he is the author of four other novels: In High Places (Bethany House Publishers, 2007), Dark Fathom (Zondervan, 2005), Deep Blue, (Zondervan 2004), and Turn Four (Zondervan 2004). In addition Tom has also written two nonfiction books: 20 American Peaks & Crags (Contemporary Books, 1978) and Wild by Nature (Baker Books, 2001). He and his family live in Orlando, Florida.
ABOUT THE BOOK
You Can’t Outrun the Sins of Your Past
Desperate to forget what happened to him in Iraq, Tyler Perkins flees to the emptiness of Wyoming. He’s here to escape and also to fulfill a long-ago promise by accompanying his 86-year-old friend Soren Andeman on a fly-fishing trip–once more for old time’s sake. But their trek to an idyllic trout lake soon becomes something more deeply harrowing–a journey that uncovers long-held lies, deadly crimes, and the buried secrets of the past. Ty barely has time to contemplate the question of what constitutes justice when nature unleashes her own revenge. Trapped in a race back to safety, he must face his own guilt-ridden past or risk being consumed.
Powerfully imagined by the acclaimed author of In High Places, Wind River is an engaging wilderness adventure that explores the power of confession, the beauty of forgiveness, and the freedom of truth unveiled.
If you would like to read the first chapter, go HERE
Sally Says: A couple years ago I read Tom Morrissey’s first book and enjoyed it enough that I remembered his name and said I needed to read his future books. So I did, this being the second of his that I’ve read.
But Wind River fell flat to me. Part of that may be due to the actual writing, but part of it may be due to the back cover copy. The back cover promised a suspense book, a story full of long-buried secrets, some danger perhaps, and a dramatic climax when nature gets involved.
The book had little of any of that.
The first 200 pages were a camping trip with very little conflict, very little action. Yes, Ty has his war issues and the way it’s affected his marriage, but that hardly takes up any space. Instead Ty and Soren take a camping trip, and the story is full of them fly-fishing and eating their catches, getting equipment packed up and then unpacked when they stop. I kept waiting for the story to start, but instead there were more details on types of lures used and brand names of various camping equipment that I couldn’t decipher even by their use in the novel. It wasn’t until the last 100 pages that what was promised on the back cover ever appeared in the book, and even then it wasn’t anywhere near as intense as what it was made to sound like.
So I can blame that part on whoever wrote the back cover copy — which probably wasn’t the author. Whenever a back cover copy only tells the climax of the book, the reader’s in for a disappointment because either they know everything that leads up to that climax from the back cover copy or (as in this case) there’s just not much happening.
But another problem with the book was the way the characters were so distant from the reader. The technical term, I believe, is called Deep Point of View, and this book was about as far from that as possible. Deep POV is getting the reader inside the character’s head, letting us hear his struggles, his thoughts, his reactions, etc. It makes US the character and makes us root for him.
There was very little to none of that in this book. And I kept seeing opportunities for it all over the place. Perhaps it was done on purpose to show how distanced Ty was keeping himself from people, but instead it made the book fall flat. Instead of a fishing scene that shows how much Ty’s struggling with someone, it was just a fishing scene. We were watching people camp without every getting inside their minds.
So for me, Wind River was not a good read. I won’t rule out any of Tom’s other books because I remember how much I enjoyed that first one, but I do hope they’re all different from this latest one.