Blog Tour: Yours Truly, Thomas

Title:  Yours Truly, Thomas

Author: Rachel Fordham

Pages: 322

Genre: Christian Historical fiction

Rating: 4 stars

Can you fall in love with someone through letters?  This was a question that I never really thought about till I read Yours Truly, Thomas.  This new book by Rachel Fordham answered that question and then some.   The dead letter office played a huge part in the story. I knew that the dead letter office was a modern thing I didn't realize that it had been a part of the USPS since almost the beginning. Apparently there have always been lost letters.

Two of the characters are bought together thought a letter that ended up at the dead letter office.  All in all, this book was a sweet read.  I am looking forward future books from this author.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher through netgalley as part of a blog tour. I was not required to write a positive review. All opinions expressed are mine alone.

Review of The Refuge

Title:  The Refuge

Author: Ann H Gabhart

Chapters: 35 plus epilogue

Pages: 400

Genre: Christian Historical fiction

Rating: 4 stars

The Refuge by Ann H. Gabhart is not my first by her, but it is my first Shaker book that I’ve read.  Darcie and her husband end up at Harmony Hill the fictional Shaker village in Kentucky to ride out a Cholera epidemic when he’s killed in an accident. Leaving Darcie widowed and pregnant something that the Shaker’s don’t really know how to deal with. When she meets widower Flynn Keller and his daughter.

I’m not going to lie I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would. I don’t read Amish fiction and for some reason that’s how I was viewing fiction books about the Shakers the same way. I was surprised but in a good way.  Ann gave her characters in this book the same depth that she gives all her characters. 

Even though Harmony Hill is a fictional Shaker village it was easy to picture how it was set up because I’ve been to both Shaker villages in Kentucky. And I have a feeling that Ann based Harmony Hill on the Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill in central Kentucky.   Ann brings life to her historical novels as well as the Kentucky setting, all of her books I’ve read have been set in Kentucky and I love that. 

My favorite character in the book wasn’t Darcie or Flynn instead it was Flynn’s young daughter whose headstrong nature reminded me a bit of myself at that age. To me she makes the whole book.

The Refuge is a book about leaving to trust God and his timing not our timing.  I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys Christian historical fiction. As well as readers who like to read fictional stories based on real historic places.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher as part of a blog tour. I was not required to write a positive review. All opinions expressed are mine alone.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher through netgalley. I was not required to write a positive review. All opinions expressed are mine alone.

Blog Tour review of A Sparkle of Sliver

Title:  A Sparkle of Silver

Author: Liz Johnson

Series: Georgia Coast Romance book 1

 

Chapters: 21 plus epilogue

Pages: 358

Genre: Christian Contemporary with a hint a mystery and Romance

Rating: 4 stars

Millie Sullivan is determined to find away to provide nursing care for her grandma joy the grandma who raised her.  Even snoop around the estate of oil tycoon Howard Dawkins after getting a job as a 20s era guest and tour guide. She's then caught by one of the security guards Ben Thornton a man dealing with his own family troubles.  She makes a deal with him in order to split the treasure.   If he helps her and doesn't turn her end, because even though she only took the job to snoop she really does need the second job.  Against  his better judgement he accepts and agrees to help her.  Sending them both on a journey that they didn't see coming. 

This sweet novel set on St Simons Island Georgia is part contemporary novel, part mystery with just a hint of romance.  Millie and Ben with next to nothing in common, even though he works three jobs he still has a college degree. Millie doesn't she works as a waitress trying to keep her grandmother in her assisted living d who loves reading.  A 90 year old mystery  both want to find the treasure neither  was counting on finding something else instead. 

Millie and Ben were great characters and grandma Joy was such a sweetheart.  Even with everything she had been through in her life Joy never lost her faith she was still trusting God. Even when her granddaughter's faith was shaky.    Millie I have to say was indeed my favorite character mainly because she was the one that was easiest one to relate too. I too know what it’s like to be the only one taking care of a grandparent not because you’re the only one, but because your younger sister in school and needs to finish college.  So it was easy to feel every emotion that Millie was dealing with through the whole book.  The fact that she's a bookworm didn't hurt nor the fact one of my favorite quotes from the book came from her "talking about if she had the money she'd choice books and bookshelves over steak." A girl after my own heart. 

Ben as far as male main characters go was a little on the nerdy side but that was a refreshing change as you don't see many slightly nerdy characters in fiction even Christian fiction.    Ben's main goal through much of the novel is to try to make amends for something that he feels responsible for, though technically not his fault. Though Ben and Millie come from different backgrounds they both have the same thing to work on; forgiveness. 

A Sparkle of Silver by Liz Johnson might be a contemporary novel mixed with mystery and a little romance, but at the heart it is a Christian fiction novel focusing on the theme of forgiveness this novel is so much more.  The Christian message while subtle is still there, woven throughout the story.  Of expecting God's forgiveness, forgiven yourself and finally forgiven others.  The other theme in the novel  besides faith is the love of family, and learning that sometimes blood might make you related it doesn't always make you family love makes you family. 

I enjoyed A Sparkle of Silver by Liz Johnson which just happens to be my first book by her but it will not be my last.  I look forward to the next book in this series as well as going back to read her other books. 

I received a copy of this book from the publisher I was not required to write a positive review. All opinions expressed are mine alone.

Liz Johnson's website

Pre order link