Book Reviews

Book Review—The Trouble With Nancy

October 9, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

Book: The Trouble with Nancy

Author: Chautona Havig

Genre: Christian Historical Romance, Western

Release Date: July 18, 2019

NOTE: I WAS GIVEN A COPY OF THIS BOOK BY THE AUTHOR. ALL OPINIONS EXPRESSED ARE MY OWN. LINKS IN THIS POST MAY BE AFFILIATE LINKS

Her reputation precedes her, whether the bad guys realize it or not.

Nancy Harrison has finally stepped out of her prissy box and tried to do something helpful–but did she go overboard in her first self-less act?

She can’t ride, she hates horses, and she’s terrified of being alone. What’s a girl to do?

Join the Pony Express, of course.

When Nancy Harrison’s family receives a tax bill they can’t pay, there’s only one option open to them. Her brother, Lewis, will have to join the Pony Express and earn the money that way.

It would have worked, too, if ruffians hadn’t attacked him and broken his leg.

She doesn’t want to do it, of course, but what choice is there? Lose everything or ride a stupid, smelly horse for a few weeks? Nancy decides that she’ll chop off her hair, take to the dusty overland trail, and prove that she isn’t a “flighty little thing.”

But things go from bad to worse as she discovers that riding astride is worse than sidesaddle—especially when you’re not used to it.

Can’t she just go back home to balls, teas, and the hope of a suitor before her twentieth birthday? Sans her hair, of course, because that’ll entice the fellows. Sigh.

My Thoughts:

There is only one author that I love the writing of so well that I make sure I read everything she writes. That is Chautona Havig. She has a way of taking a common theme and putting a very different twist on it, or of taking an unusual theme, and either way she makes a very believable story with characters you feel like you really know. In The Trouble With Nancy, she has a girl disguise herself as a boy to ride the Pony Express. A girl pretending to be a man isn’t that unusual—but quite often, in a case like that, the girl saves the day by being smarter than the men around her, or something along that line. Not so in this case!

Nancy’s mother had a problem. She had just been informed that there was a tax owing on the home her husband left her when he died, and if the tax wasn’t paid, she would lose her home. Not to worry, said her brother-in-law; he had a plan. Sell the house to him, and move into his house. That was not her plan—but what could she do? Her son Lewis decided to become a Pony Express rider to earn the money to pay the tax—but then he was attacked and injured. What would become of the family now?

Nancy had always been rather a prissy, self-centered girl. She couldn’t ride, she hated dirt and heat. All she wanted was to get married—but she looked like her brother except for her beautiful hair. Suddenly, she knew what she had to do to save the family: Take Lewis’s place as a Pony Express rider! However, she found herself in deep water when things were different from what she expected—and she had to put up with smelly, awful horses that she could hardly stay on top of. Would she survive her trip across the country and back?

This is a beautiful account of a girl learning to put others first. I also love the way she learns about God and relying on Him. The spiritual lessons are woven in so gently that I almost didn’t pick up on them, but a few passages were real gems. After she reached home again, she was telling a friend how she learned to rely on knowing God was with her, but now that she was home, she felt distanced from Him. Her friend’s counsel to her was invaluable

I wouldn’t say this is one of my favorite of Chautona’s books, but it is a good one. It’s clean, light reading, and a fun adventure/mystery story. I read it when I wasn’t feeling good and needed to lay down, and just wanted something easy to read. If you like historical fiction set in the West, you’ll enjoy it.

About the Author:

Chautona Havig lives in an oxymoron, escapes into imaginary worlds that look startlingly similar to ours and writes the stories that emerge. An irrepressible optimist, Chautona sees everything through a kaleidoscope of It’s a Wonderful Life sprinkled with fairy tales. Find her on the web and say howdy—if you can remember how to spell her name.

Video Chat with Chautona:

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Book Review—Hashtag Rogue

October 2, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

Book: Hashtag Rogue

Author: Chautona Havig

Genre: Fiction / Contemporary / Suspense

Release Date: August 20, 2019

NOTE: I WAS GIVEN A COPY OF THIS BOOK BY THE AUTHOR. ALL OPINIONS EXPRESSED ARE MY OWN. LINKS IN THIS POST MAY BE AFFILIATE LINKS.

Something is terribly wrong in The Agency. Again.

Flynne Dortmann: computer specialist extraordinaire. The right arm of every agent in The Agency. And totally untrained for agent duty.

So when no one takes a threat seriously, Flynne does the only thing she can think of.

With money she has no authorization to use, a gun she’s never fired in her hip pocket, and more zip-ties than any agent should be allowed to carry, Flynne takes on protective detail for an unwilling client. #Rogue.

Mark Cho hasn’t had a chance to get used to being Marco Mendina—head of the Eastern US Agency. Not only that, every sign points to someone knowing he isn’t who he appears to be. His agency is in trouble. His agents may be in danger, and with an office girl gone rogue, deciding what problem to tackle first is a problem in itself.

Not to mention, he misses his office assistant with her emoji-speak, killer tech skills, and sharp instincts.

My Thoughts:

When you enjoy a series of books, you’re always thrilled to see a new one come out. I have enjoyed all four of The Agency Files, so I knew I would like Hashtag Rogue as well—and I did! Not many, if any, loose ends from other books were tied up, although more were created, but the story within this book is complete, and it was great fun to get to see Flynne in action in her own book.

Flynne was the office girl for The Agency. She did a wonderful job of keeping things running smoothly—despite the way she talked. Her constant emoji-speak of things that were totes adorbs, or puffy-hearting other things, had grown on Mark, but he wasn’t ready yet to believe her when she saw signs that Erika was in danger. What could Flynne do about it but take off on her own to save Erika, even if she didn’t know the first thing about protection, and didn’t have any sort of a plan. Would Keith be able to reach them in time to save the day?

Flynne and Erika left Rockland and found a place to hide, but Erika had to put up with watching Flynne flirting with the caretaker of the place. Then, they had to run from there—and found themselves in even more danger. Meanwhile, the Agency itself seemed to be in danger. Who was trying to take it down, and why?

Don’t try to read this book too fast. You’ll miss a lot. At the same time, it’s a hard one to read slowly, because the constant danger makes you want to keep turning pages. There are a lot of characters and plot lines going on at the same time, and trying to keep them all straight was a bit difficult. I loved the way the characters all interacted with each other, though, and all those plots worked together to tell a bigger story. I was glad to see Keith back, and his faith growing again. Erika’s faith is growing in this book, too, and even Mark is starting to lean more towards God. On the other hand, this is rather a rough story, with more violence in it than I normally like. At the same time, it’s a very clean story, with rough language referred to but not printed (some of the ways in which we are told about this language is quite hilarious!). I highly recommend this book, and the whole series, if you like mysteries.

About the Author:

Chautona Havig lives in an oxymoron, escapes into imaginary worlds that look startlingly similar to ours and writes the stories that emerge. An irrepressible optimist, Chautona sees everything through a kaleidoscope of It’s a Wonderful Life sprinkled with fairy tales. Find her on the web and say howdy—if you can remember how to spell her name.

Read an Excerpt:

Erika ordered her eyes to open. They declined the offer. Once more, and with as much of a mental drill sergeant tone as she could muster, she demanded the possibility of sight.

Neither eyelid gave so much as a twitch.

Resigned, she then tried to ascertain the reason for said incorporation by the lids of her eyes. Her brain, too, had gone AWOL. White noise replaced rational thought, grit, replaced natural eye moisture, and if the sensation coming from her tongue could be trusted, she’d transformed into a cottonmouth.

Except that I can’t slither. I know I can’t.

That, Erika decided, was improvement. It just had to be rational thought. Oh, God please.

A question arose. Do I pray? The moment she asked, Erika nodded—inwardly, anyway. I do. Not sure since when… maybe that’ll come next.

Clarity formed when a voice broke through what might or might not have been consciousness. “Oh, thank whatever you’re supposed to thank—don’t want to be, like, totes offensive if I’m not supposed to say, ‘God,’ but I was afraid you had flat-lined.”

“Flynne?”

“Yay! She lives!”

Why do I feel like that’s supposed to be “He lives?”

“So, can you sit up if I help you?”

Bile churned in Erika’s gut. Her eyes felt like they bugged, but she wasn’t even confident she could see anymore. Then Flynne’s purple, green, and blue hair came into view. She glared, wrestling her mouth into contortions and fighting back the urge to vomit. “Please!”

It came out more like, “Mmmweeeeeffff”

“Can’t understand you.” Flynne’s eyes narrowed.

Perspiration formed on Erika’s forehead, neck, and in every other uncomfortable place. Cold, clammy perspiration.

“Do you promise not to scream if I take this off?” She tapped the tape.

Erika just nodded with vehemence that nearly lost her what breakfast she’d eaten.

Again, Flynne’s eyes grew even narrower than the first time. “Okay…” Eyes wide, the girl ripped off her high-top converse and pulled a sock from her foot. “So help me, if you scream, I’m stuffing this in your mouth—supes gross.” She wriggled it for effect—just in case Erika didn’t catch the utter disgustingness of it.

Once more, Erika nodded and pleaded. You’re so going to regret threatening me with that.

If Satan wanted to recruit torturers to relieve demons, Flynne would have been perfect for the job. She worked the tiniest corner of the duct tape free. Erika choked and grimaced. She jerked her head hard to the right. Flynne stared. Once more, she jerked it.

“You want me to rip it off? That’ll hurt!”

But the moment Flynne said “rip,” Erika began bobbing her head fast enough to ensure she drowned in vomit within seconds. Flynne had mad ripping skills, however. In less than three seconds, the tape jerked free—and so did the contents of Erika’s stomach.

All over Flynne’s bare foot and Converse shoes. The moment she stopped heaving, Erika glared up at the girl and moaned, “That’s payback for this.”

The battle of the glares began. Flynne broke the silence that followed first. “If you weren’t Keith’s girlfriend and religious, I’d swear at you. Consider yourself cussed out.” Before Erika could choose between the half-dozen scathing remarks fighting for preeminence, Flynne froze. “Wait. You called me, like, every name in the book. I thought you religious people couldn’t do that!”

The churning began again. “I did?” If she could have gagged, she would have. If she could have puked she might have. “Do I want to know what I said?”

Without hesitation, Flynne rattled off every inappropriate word Erika had spent the last few months working to eradicate from her vocabulary. “Then you got all sesquipedalian on me.”

“Sesquatch-what?”

Flynne turned a little green herself as the stench of partially digested breakfast assaulted her olfactory system. “Sesquipedalian.” At Erika’s doubtful look, Flynne went into action. She removed her other shoe, disappeared outside, returned with clean feet and ready to do business. “For your information it’s a big word that means, ‘a big word.’”

“No offense, Flynne, but you aren’t exactly known for your erudition.”

The girl gave a fine imitation of a puppy cocking its head—a blue, green, and purple-haired puppy. “That’s not one of the word-of-the-day words I’ve had. C’mon… let’s get you cleaned up and inside.”

She peeked her head outside, scanned the area, and looked back at Erika. “No one’s in the neighborhood that I can tell, but you’d be smart not to go all screamo on me or anything that would call the cops.”

“And why’s that?”

Flynne tried to be surreptitious, but Erika caught her eying a white Camry on the other side of the garage before answering, “Because I can get you out of here before they arrive, and you don’t want to be awake when I’m driving fast.”

Something deep in her gut—something other than the renewed churning that hinted she might lose what was left of the contents of her stomach—hinted that Flynne might not be exaggerating. But I’m not going to let her know that. It’d serve her right if I puked all over that car. What’d she do with hers, anyway?

After throwing a dark look at her, Flynne stalked from the garage and returned a few minutes later with a roll of duct tape slid over her arm like a grunge bracelet gone wrong. “You’re already in hot water with the Big Guy for your potty mouth, so don’t add lies. Stuff it or stick it?”

“If you tape my mouth and I vomit, you’ll be responsible for my death. Just sayin’.”

“Then don’t make noise.” Flynne glared at her. “I’m just trying to help here. Just sayin’.”

Didn’t know you had that much grit. The woozy, stomach-revolting-on-every-side feeling returned in time for Erika to make a decision. “I’m not going to scream. I don’t want to puke in a cop car, either. But if you don’t get me inside where I can be comfortably horizontal with a bowl by my side, I’m going to puke all over you and enjoy every second of it.” Her stomach rumbled. Mostly.

That perked Flynne up for reasons Erika couldn’t fathom. She hooked her tape-free arm under Erika’s and said, “Then let’s go, Kokomo!”

That’s way too old-school—like fifty years old school. A vague memory poked through the cloud cover of her mind. “I think Keith gave me vitamins or drugs to combat after-effects. I think I need those.”

Not until Flynne had her tucked up on a couch in the family room, a bright red mixing bowl on the floor beside it and a glass of water on the coffee table, did Flynne bother to answer. “Sorry. I was freakazoiding when I left the Agency and just got what I thought I needed to get you safe. I’m not trained for this.”

“Then call Keith. He’ll come. He is trained, and he’ll take care of me.”

Even as she said it, Erika knew it was futile. Flynne had it in her head that this was necessary. So, she could wait. The Agency would take care of her job, her bills, and Flynne could learn that being an agent wasn’t a good career choice. Everything would be just fine for a few days—until Flynne got over herself.

The first epithet marched across the stage of her mind, stepped up to the mic and tapped it, ready to let loose. Erika groaned.

As if propelled by itself, the red bowl appeared at her lips. “I’m sorry! I don’t know what I’m doing. The stuff these guys have to do—totes amazeballs!”

“I was groaning at my language. Can you be quiet for a minute or two while I pray? It’s totes impossible to take repentance seriously when you’re puffy hearting your cray-cray amazeballs.”

“Coolio. Sure thing.”

I just lost fifty IQ points. I know it. Let’s start with prayers for rejuvenated little gray cells and move onto repentance after that. Okay, Lord?

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Book Review—Adventures in Poverty

September 6, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 3 Comments

Book: Adventures in Poverty
Author: Nancy Bolton
Genre: Memoir
Release Date: July 30, 2019

NOTE: I WAS GIVEN A COPY OF THIS BOOK BY THE AUTHOR. ALL OPINIONS EXPRESSED ARE MY OWN. LINKS IN THIS POST MAY BE AFFILIATE LINKS.

Faced with eviction, living on union strike pay, our time for making a decision was running out. Where could we go to live with our five small sons? We had few options. The scariest possibility was also the one that fit best with our tiny income. But could we really make such a difficult move? To transport our family, and our mobile home onto a five-acre parcel of rural, undeveloped land? No electricity, no running water, with winter fast approaching. It sounded a little crazy…….

My Thoughts:

I’ve always enjoyed reading true stories about people who move to a farm and work to make a living. A story told by a person about his or her own life has always fascinated me! I used to look for books like that in the library; most of the stories happened in the 1950s or 60s. When Adventures in Poverty came available for review, I was immediately intrigued. Here was a story of a family moving to the land in the 1980s!

Nancy Bolton tells her family’s story of living on next to nothing. Her husband, a salt miner, went on strike with his co-workers, and their income dropped to a mere pittance. What could they do? I thought their answer was rather creative—and very brave. They bought undeveloped land via land contract, and moved their house trailer to it, living without electricity or running water, or even gas for the stove, with five little children, and winter coming. What a challenge!

I thoroughly enjoyed Nancy’s account of how they managed. From hauling water in buckets from a nearby reservoir and living on canned foods that needed no refrigeration, to planting a garden in the spring and raising all the food they could, the family found ways to feed themselves and make every dollar stretch. Gradually, life grew easier, and this creative family found ways to work around each difficulty they were presented with.

This is not only a story of physically surviving and thriving, it is also an inspiring story of faith in God. Nancy doesn’t talk a lot about their faith, but it is very definitely a part of who they are. I appreciated her final thoughts at the end of the book: “We experienced firsthand that hardships will come and go, but with God’s help, we didn’t need to fear them—just remember that we’d learn something useful from them.” I was also challenged by this thought, from about halfway through the book: “Again, I was faced with the dilemma of how to appreciate the generosity of others and thankfully receive a blessing, while at the same time I felt inside that if we couldn’t manage things ourselves, it was somehow a failure to accept help from others.” I recommend this story to anyone who enjoys reading personal memoirs, and real-life stories of country living (warning—it’s not all pretty; the Bolton boys saw firsthand some of the cruelty that exists in nature).

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher, and these are my honest thoughts about it.

WARNING: Yikes is used in chapter 1. Darn appears once each in chapters 23, 27 and 29.

About the Author:

Nancy Shew Bolton is a wife, mother, grandmother, jewelry maker, crochet crafter, and of course: a writer! She lives in upstate New York in a lovely scenic region known as The Fingerlakes. Widowed last year, she is comforted by her five sons, two grandchildren and a marvelous array of family and other loved ones. She loves the creative process, and puts her whole focus into the stories she writes. May you be entertained and uplifted by them!

More From Nancy:

Sometimes life hands out an unexpected challenge, and the direction you mapped out for your family comes up against a big roadblock. And there you are, trying to navigate back to a path that makes sense. One that would be as close to the previous path as you can get. But our only options led us in directions far away from what we were used to.

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Book Review: Britfield & the Lost Crown

August 27, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

We very much enjoy reading books together, as you surely know by now if you read my blog much. When I was offered the chance to review Britfield & the Lost Crown, I thought we would enjoy it, although we don’t very often read books that are purely adventure stories, as this one is. I found it amusing, all the way through, the way some of the older children griped about the things they didn’t like about the story—yet I caught one of them reading ahead a couple of times!

The story begins in an orphanage somewhere in England. This is not a nice place to be; actually, the place seems like a nightmare. Not only are the orphans treated purely as slave labor, they must follow a myriad of nonsensical rules, they are nearly starved, and not allowed to learn anything. Tom is finally fed up with all this, and after learning, somewhat by accident, that his parents are still living, as well as that his life is about to become absolutely unbearable, he decides it’s time to escape—with Sarah, his best friend.

The adventures begin! One narrow escape follows another, but when the two children are surrounded at the train station, what can they do? Detective Gowerstone won’t give up—they can’t either! Suddenly, they find a hot air balloon ready to take off—and commandeer it. Where will they end up? In the course of trying frantically to stay free, they find themselves, over the next few days, in Oxford, Windsor Castle, and London. Finally, they reach the end of the line, with nowhere left to go. What will happen to them now? Will they ever learn the truth about Tom’s family, which has been hinted at ever since they left the orphanage? Which people are really their friends—and which their enemies?

As I mentioned at the beginning, the older children (ages 13-21) had a lot to gripe about in this book. They felt like there were too many incongruities; the story is set in the present, but in some ways feels medieval. The countless narrow escapes were too unrealistic, and the action was over the top. Yet, at the same time, they wanted to hear the rest of the story! The younger ones (ages 7-9) simply enjoyed the adventurous aspect!

I agree with my older children that the action is a bit overdone. I also did not like the violence; there was shooting several times, and some other violence. There was also a fair amount of questionable language, and some lying. However, if you are looking for a book to get boys reading, and don’t mind the language I’ve listed below, as well as some violence, this is definitely a story that will appeal. On the other hand, the vocabulary used in this book is rich! That was another complaint from some in my family, but I, personally, loved it.

There is a study guide that goes along with Britfield & the Lost Crown. It is available as a free download for teachers and homeschoolers here. The first 6 chapters are studied in pairs; the rest of the 17 chapters are studied singly. Each chapter has a vocabulary section, and a comprehension section where the child is to answer questions about the action in the story. Then, there is a “digging deeper” section, where the child is to think about his or her personal reaction to some part of the story. After that are suggestions for researching various topics or people mentioned in the story. I thought, at first, that maybe we would use this study guide, but we didn’t end up doing anything with it. We just read and enjoyed the story! It would be good for vocabulary and comprehension practice, as well as the geography and history of England.

WARNING: Chapter 6: What the heck. Chapter 7: oh my gosh, what the heck, yikes, darn, blimey, bloody, darn, what the heck. Chapter 9: bloody, idiot, what the heck. Chapter 10: you stinking little brat, that blaggard, you dicey little scoundrel, “Rubbish,” he cursed. Chapter 11: someone lies twice (I think this happened other times, too, but I didn’t note them). Chapter 13: bloody, get the heck out of here, smashing glass in someone’s face. Chapter 13: wha da heck, blasted, bloody. Chapter 15: you stupid little man, knocking someone unconscious, you idiot, stupid. Chapter 16: cursing, that freak.

Be sure to click the picture below to read what 74 other families thought of this book!

Product Review—Early 19th Century American History

August 2, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Our normal school days have very little variety. We do math and language arts and Bible lessons, and read stories set in historical times, trying to get a grasp on what happened back then. When the chance came along to review a product from Home School In the Woods, I decided it would be good for all of us to do something different, so I requested The Early 19th Century from their Time Travelers U. S. History Studies line. I knew the school holidays were coming up, and while we don’t normally take any time off, a friend was coming to stay a week with the boys, so I thought we’d take time off our regular school and do this course during that time. Since it took longer than that to do the course, we just cut out other things from our normal days for a few weeks and spent a lot of time doing this.

When I received The Early 19th Century, it took a little while to figure out how to use it. There were so many different folders and PDF files I was confused! Finally, I figured out that the first step was to print the text and project PDF for a lesson, and then I would be able to figure out which masters we needed for the particular lesson. That made it much easier! I just printed, each evening, what we needed for the next day. The instructions for the projects are simple and easy to follow. Each morning when we did a lesson, I read the text aloud while the children started coloring and cutting out the day’s projects. We aimed to spend an hour a day on this course, although it often ended up being an hour and a half. This shows us, the night before we started, sorting pages out and getting ready to start.

The course is laid out in 25 daily lessons. Every 5^th lessson is a catch-up day, where you simply finish the projects for the week. Day 23 is another of those, and Day 24 is when you assemble a lot of the things you did into a lap-book. We did that yesterday. On Day 25, you are supposed to have a Chuck Wagon Dinner, and invite grandparents or friends to show off what you learned—we probably won’t do anything for that. We did most of the projects, although there were a few for which I couldn’t easily find the needed materials, so we just skipped them. Each of the catch-up days includes a few recipes for foods that would have been eaten in the first half of the 19^th Century. I’m keeping those in mind for possible future use.

Here we are, during the first lesson, figuring out what we’re doing.

A wide range of subjects were covered in this course. Some were fairly common topics, such as the war between Texas and Mexico, which included the Alamo, or the Erie Canal, and some were things I knew very little about—like the Tripolitan War with the Barbary Pirates. One lesson was devoted to learning about the presidents who held office during the early 1800s, and another briefly covered a number of other famous people from that era. One lesson talked about the mountain men, there were two lessons about the pioneers, and one talked about the gold prospectors. The last lesson talks about slavery in America up to 1850.

Every lesson has copywork, which is sentences from McGuffey’s reader. We didn’t do this, since the boys all have penmanship practice in their language arts books. Almost every day, we also put some pictures on our timeline. Throughout the course we added to a songbook of early American songs. Some were ones we read about in the Little House books, so it was fun to hear them (I looked the songs up on YouTube and we listened to them; if the words weren’t clear, I read the songs aloud.)

A lot of the projects are simply cutting out mini-books and pasting them together; of course, we read the text blocks together. I liked the ones where they had to write something about the topic, but the boys didn’t! We each put together a timeline of American history from 1790-1850, and made a map with different layers to show the growth of the United States from 1800-1850. That was fun; I’ve always liked the maps like that in the encyclopedia, and now we know how we can make them ourselves. We didn’t quite get this project finished; we may come back and do it yet. There were also a few projects like pretending to pan for gold or make a Mexican serape, which we didn’t do. Here is Little Miss’s version of the quilt pattern we colored in.

This project was fun. They each wrote several sentences about the mountain man/explorer inside the minibook, and then added something to the picture to make it 3-dimensional. The suggestion for Jedidiah Smith was to glue fur on, but we didn’t have any—so I grabbed the clippers and cut Mr. Sweetie’s hair!

By far the favorite project was the jumping jack. This was based on toys that early Americans would have made, and everyone had great fun putting theirs together and playing with it! The model log cabins were fun, too. The hardest project we did was a “Daguerrotype Photo Album.” It took us a week just to do that one project! The instructions said to print the pictures for it on ivory paper, but we didn’t have any, so we printed them on white paper. Then, we brewed some strong black tea, dipped the paper in it, and dried it on top of the wood stove. To make the pictures look old, we tore around them. Then, we were to glue them onto foil-covered card stock and into the album, and write about each of the people. Since there are 17 pictures, it took awhile!

There are pros and cons to using this course. Some of the pros, for us, would be that it gave us something different to do in the middle of the school year. The boys all liked that they had only math or language arts to do in a day, not both. They also enjoyed making things from paper. It gave us some art/craft time, which we don’t tend to get otherwise. We learned new techniques for making things from paper (I learned that none of them had heard of scoring cardstock for folding it!), and they practiced coloring and making things look as nice as possible. They also learned what two-sided tape is and how to use it.

We used a lot of 2-sided tape to put together these lapbooks, but it was worth it. The children are all happy with their final product.

See how thrilled she is to show off hers? I’m not sure who took this picture; I found it on the camera this morning!

As far as cons, the biggest one would be all the printing. I spent a lot of time at it, trying to get the cardstock printed correctly (I now know a lot more about the innards of the printer than I did before!). It also cost a lot to do that printing. We went through about a ream of paper, since I was making five copies of everything, and had to buy extra cardstock, which, where we live, is hard to find and expensive. I was glad when Esther found a place we could order it online!

One of the last projects was to make a game with which to review what we learned. We played it this morning for our history time.

Overall, I’m happy that we used this course. It’s not the way we normally do history, and we would have gotten more out of it if we had done it more slowly and read books to go along with the supplied text. However, we’ll be going through that era slowly within the next year, so we’ll be referring to our projects at times. If we hadn’t gone through it as fast as we did, we never would have finished it, knowing us! If you and your children enjoy hands-on activities to go along with historical studies, try out the Time Travelers line of products. They are well-done and we really enjoyed what we did. Or, if you’re not sure whether this type of study is for you, this would be a good way to find out! And, here’s an interesting blog post I found about this series, which explains why the publisher pulled it together and some of their thoughts about how to use it.

World History (Project Passport), U.S. History Studies (Time Travelers) and Timeline Collection: A Collection of Historical Timeline Figures {Home School in the Woods Reviews}

What We’re Reading—July 2019

July 24, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Note: Links in this post may be affiliate links, and if they are, they will benefit Esther.

We’ve been reading just as much as usual lately, but it doesn’t feel like we’ve gotten through as many books as normal. Some of them have been long! We are just finishing Uncle Arthur’s Bible Stories, Volume 10—now we need to choose a different Bible story book to read. We finished David Macaulay’s Cathedral, which we were reading when I wrote the last post like this, and followed that with his Pyramid. We found it quite fascinating! One sentence that Mr. Intellectual really liked said something about how this Pharoah (imaginary, by the way) built his pyramid 10 feet lower than the Great Pyramid, out of respect for the great Khufu—but built it on higher ground, which made the peak 10 feet higher than Khufu’s! One thing that made this book especially interesting was that we have been reading Genesis and Exodus lately for Family Worship, so we grabbed this book and referred to it when we read about Joseph being embalmed to see what was done with his body. Since we finished that one, we have started reading Pagoo, a delightful story about a hermit crab from hatching, on through the rest of his life. Our last book each morning has to do with history; the latest one is Drumbeats in Williamsburg. It has to do with the events around Cornwallis’s surrender at Yorktown. Of course, a lot of the story is predictable—as expected, the main character finds the spy! It’s pretty interesting, though.

After lunch is when we read the books the children choose. We’ve been reading through the Little House Series for over a year now, and to finish it off we’re going through The Three Faces of Nellie, about the three different people Laura based the character of Nellie Oleson on. I’m reading the interesting parts, and skipping over the repetitious genealogical bits. After that, we’re reading Gone-Away Lake, which has been a long-time favorite in our family. Two children who are exploring the woods near their home get lost and find themselves in a dried-up lake bed, then find a row of falling-down houses with only two people living in them. It’s quite a fun adventure! Our third book each day for the past couple of months has been Kayaks Down the Nile, about three men who kayaked from near the start of the Nile River to its mouth at the Mediterranean in the 1950s. This inspired Mr. Imagination to shape a kayak from a blanket, and make a “cataract” from bits of cardboard, which he helped Little Miss to kayak through. We finished it a couple of days ago and started The Great Brain, which seems like it will be a fun story. I’ve never read it, though. I let Little Miss choose our fourth story, since she’s been begging me to read her chapter books. She chose Olive, the story of a foster child, for her first book.

The only other afternoon book we read in the past month was A Pig for Pablo. This is a story about a little boy in Paraguay who rescues a runt piglet, and then works to earn money to buy it. I was rather surprised by the ending—it’s not the normal story you’d expect, with the pig living as a pet forever.

The other books we’ve read for history have all had to do with the American Revolution. Fourth of July Raid had to do with a surprise attack by the British on a small town in Connecticut. This Time, Tempe Wick? is a picture book about Washington’s troops and a mutiny during a hard winter—and a girl who outsmarts them. When I found Swamp Fox of the Revolution on Internet Archive, I wanted to read it to my boys. I remember getting it from the library when I was 9 or 10; it was the only book I had ever read about the Revolutionary War in the South. We found it very interesting—a piece of history that you rarely hear about! We followed that with Traitor, by Jean Fritz—the story of Benedict Arnold. She did a superb job of making us extremely disgusted with the man and his self-centered ways! After we finished that story, we read a picture book titled Bugle, A Puppy in Old Yorktown. It’s a cute story from 1958. We enjoyed the old illustrations.

And what have I been reading? Some very interesting books! Nobody’s Boy really captured my interest; it’s the story of a 3-year-old Mennonite boy who was kidnapped in Mexico in 1926, only a few years after his family had moved there from Canada. He had no idea who he really was for over 20 years. This is a true story, and quite gripping. At the moment, I’m reading another non-fiction, I Don’t Have Enough Faith to be An Atheist. We have this book because I had downloaded the audio book several years ago when it was free, and when Gayle listened to it a year ago, he was so impressed he wanted us to have a print copy. It got loaned out before I had a chance to read it, and now that it’s back I’m quickly reading it before handing it on to another friend. It is amazing—the authors have pulled together many reasons, from all facets of science and life, to show that there has to be a God Who began and is in control of everything.

I also read a library book Esther brought home, Wonderland Creek. It was more a fluffy-style book, but I enjoyed it. The mystery woven through it kept me going till the end. I liked the theme of the story, that we need to live life, not just read books and live vicariously! The romance was nice, too, although I could have done without the distraction of a second man who courted the main character and was fairly physical with her.

Last week, I read The Inn at Hidden Run. I had read several reviews of it, and was intrigued by the differences in opinion about this story, so when I found it available for review, I thought I’d see what my opinion was. Well, it wasn’t a very fast-moving story, but it was certainly unique. There was no romance in it, which I liked. The premise of the story was that a girl showed up in town with some problems, and a genealogist helped her work through them by researching the girl’s family tree. There was a second timeline in the book, from the 1870s (the main story is modern). It felt a little forced to me to put the two stories together and have a family’s problems solved by discovering something from their past.

A couple of weeks ago, I read What a Pair! (Double Trouble Book 1) about a pair of twins in an Amish family. I have been seeing reviews of books by the author, and decided to see what her style is like. I’m frankly not impressed. Most Amish fiction feels fake to me, and this one, unfortunately, is no exception. It didn’t help that, several times, she had her characters stung by bumblebees and then pick out the stinger that was left behind.

Yesterday, I finished The Trouble With Nancy, by Chautona Havig. I wasn’t planning to read it till after the Atheist book, but then I had an afternoon/evening when I didn’t feel good and couldn’t do much. I decided some light reading would be nice, so picked up this one. It was fun, but another fluffy story. What I like about Chautona’s fluffy stories, though, is that I’m never disgusted with them. She does her research, and they are clean. Another thing I like about this one in particular is that, though it is about a girl disguising herself as a boy, she doesn’t “save the day.” She bumbles through what she’s doing and is very glad to get home and be herself again at the end.

Book Review—Blessing Bentley

July 18, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 7 Comments

Book: Blessing Bentley
Author: Chautona Havig
Genre: Fiction / Christian / Romantic Women’s Fiction
Release date: June 13, 2019

Note: I was given a copy of this book by the author. All opinions expressed are my own. Links in this post may be affiliate links.

Bentley Girard’s about to propose… to a guy she doesn’t even love.

Not THAT way anyway.

After studying everything the Bible has to say about marriage, she’s decided she wants in. Now. So who’s going to take her up on that offer?

And just why did no one reminded her that those vows include that little word, “love.”

Oops!

With her Bible in her hip pocket, and a shiny new ring on her finger, Bentley navigates this new world of marriage with grace and… oh, who is she kidding? She flounders until she gets a sure footing and hangs on tight.

My Thoughts:

The typical romance book follows a fairly set formula. You know what that is. Woman sees good-looking man, gets to know him and he falls for her, soon they are both in love and can’t live without each other. They get married. Most books are pretty predictable, and I get very tired of that. Blessing Bentley does not follow this kind of formula. I found it very refreshing, and loved all the truths that were brought out in it.

Bentley had her eye on one of the men in her singles group, but it seemed like he was happy with the way things were, just hanging out together with the group most of the time. She was happy with it, too—until one day, she was challenged to study the Bible and see what God said about marriage. What she found changed her life, and she found herself asking a man to marry her so they could glorify God together in that way. Of course, his reaction was predictable—but what would he conclude after study, prayer, and counseling with his parents?

Life did not go smoothly for Bentley and her new husband after their unconventional wedding (which you just have to read about!). All those little things that happen to test every couple’s love came up—how could she cope? Would she ever find herself in love with him?

A couple of passages really stood out to me. At one point, Bentley and her husband appear on television because their story caught the attention of someone. Bentley was challenged about submission, and replied, “People think Biblical submission means you no longer have opinions; preferences and things like that—totally not true. It’s about preferring others over ourselves.” A little later in the same interview, her mother says, “How many people in divorce court would tell you that they were ‘in love’ when they got married?” Good point! Since love is a choice, we must choose to love the one we marry. This book is full of truth, and I can hardly recommend it highly enough.

In a way I could identify with Bentley. When I said “Yes” to my husband’s proposal, I could not have said honestly that I was in love with him. I knew he was the one I wanted to spend my life with, and that he was a man of integrity that I could trust with my life, but “falling in love” came later. So much of this story rings true to me—I love it! It’s actually hard for me to write this review because I love the book so much. If you like a story that has Biblical truths woven all through it, give this book a try. Chautona has explored what marriage is intended to be, and what love really is, and made it into a wonderful story. This is my newest favorite book! I have read the digital version, but I fully intend to get myself a print copy as soon as I can get one without paying international shipping.

About the Author:

Chautona Havig lives in an oxymoron, escapes into imaginary worlds that look startlingly similar to ours and writes the stories that emerge. An irrepressible optimist, Chautona sees everything through a kaleidoscope of It’s a Wonderful Life sprinkled with fairy tales. Find her on the web and say howdy—if you can remember how to spell her name.

Guest Post From Chautona Havig:

If You Need to Save Time, Don’t Ask for Help

Not from my friend anyway. It all started with a conversation about Bentley…

She pops up now and then—the most ubiquitous (and yet not) of my unpublished characters, you might say. Who is this unsung Bentley, and why should we care about her? For that matter, why has her story been languishing in my “to be edited” pile for over a decade?”

It’s worse than that. Bentley isn’t the only book that’s been sitting there, unedited, waiting for a chance at daylight. There’s also Tait’s story. Andi’s story. Ami’s story… all the unpublished stories. Those don’t even include the partially done ones.

It’s an illness, I tell ya.

Some people may not know this about me, but I plot out my books while I’m driving. I get in the car, turn on my voice recorder, and talk to myself. You can’t know how grateful I am for cellphones. I don’t own or use one, but man I’m glad they exist. Know why? Because people don’t give you weird looks when you talk to yourself in the car now. When I was a kid, that wasn’t true. Not that I know from personal experience or anything. whistles

So one trip down south (it’s an hour and a half to go anywhere from my house, and most of my trips are at least three hours one way), I realized that Tait and Bentley’s stories could be merged. It would be awesome. Two books. One stone. If I did that to a bunch of my languishing manuscripts, I could clear out that unfinished file in no time! (Okay, let me dream here. Eternal optimist, remember?)

And that brings us back to Blessing Bentley

I was at my friend Sandy’s house (if you know Celebrate Lit, yes, that Sandy), and I told her I needed a new title. Why? Because now it included Tait and his story.

We talked. We schemed and plotted. Sandy wanted something to happen that just can’t. I’d seriously have to rewrite the entire series. Oh, and then there would be issues with already published books. Ahem.

Then it happened. She said the words. “It needs to be two books.”

I could have put an ice cube down her shirt. Do you remember how excited I was to have two combined into one??? Now we’re back to two books. Still, they were written as two. I just don’t have a satisfactory ending for Tait’s.

That’s when things got fun. Sandy tossed out one idea. I tossed it back. She remolded it and flipped it in the air. I caught it, made a few changes, and voila! We had a BOOK. And it would be adorable.

Then she swore at me.

Okay, so she actually just said, “You really need a third book, friend.”

Anyone who has ever heard her talk, can hear her voice there. I know you can. Still, as sweet and kind as she might have meant to sound, I heard swearing.

Another book. You’ve got to be kidding me! I went from having two books morphed into one being split back in two, and now you want to add one? I’m trying to reduce the to-do pile!

But then I remembered another story that’s been percolating since I wrote 31 Kisses. Carson’s brother is newly single. And well…

Yep. Enter trilogy.

Marriage of Conviction—that was supposed to be the title of Blessing Bentley. Who knew that when I started writing that book fifteen years ago—who knew it would end up being the title of a series instead. Marriages of Conviction. Blessing Bentley, Tempting Tait, and Charming Chloe.

Welcome to a new look on marriage and a wild ride with these characters!

And remember… if you think I have too many series… Well, this one’s Sandy’s fault.

To purchase your copy, click here.

To visit more of the blog stops on this tour, click here. (Scroll down the page to see the stops.)

To enter a fun giveaway, click here.

Book Review—The Heart Changer

July 11, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

As anyone who regularly reads my blog knows, we do a lot of reading aloud. I read for half an hour or more in the morning while the dishes are being washed, and again after lunch while those dishes are being done. We really enjoy historical fiction, so when The Heart Changer by Jarm Del Boccio, Author, was offered for review, I requested it as fast as I could! We received a MOBI copy of this book from the publisher, because the shipping to New Zealand is so high (one of the few things I don’t like about living here—guess you can’t have everything!). I was pleased with the formatting of this book; it was well-done, with all the features I’m used to getting with Kindle books from Amazon. It’s a short book; although there are 25 chapters, each one took me only 2-5 minutes to read aloud.

The Heart Changer tells the story of the Isrealite girl who was captured by Syrian raiders and taken to Damascus to be a servant of Naaman’s wife. If you have ever read the books of Kings in the Bible, you’ll remember this story, how Naaman contracted leprosy and the girl told him about the prophet Elisha in Samaria who could heal him. This story is told from her point of view.

Miriam was terrified, naturally, when she was captured by the Syrian raiders. She was also angry and bitter that God would allow such a thing to happen to her. All the way to Syria, Miriam complained to her friend who had also been captured, and her friend tried to point her to God. By the time she reached her destination, Miriam had become willing to be a good servant—but could she ever forgive Captain Naaman for his part in destroying her home and possibly her family? When disaster struck him, how would she respond?

As far as the basic story, we really enjoyed it. This short book brought the time of the kings to life, and helped us to feel what it would have been like to live in Israel at that time. The theme of the story, which was how God can transform a hard, bitter heart, is also quite good. There were just a few things that struck us as not quite true-to-life. One of them was the way Miriam talked to God a few times. She called Him Abba, or Abba Father. My understanding is that the ancient Jews would not have talked so familiarly to God; they held Him in such awe that they would not so much as pronounce His name Jehovah, let alone call Him Father. Today, of course, He is our Father—but I don’t believe they would have looked at Him that way at that time. Another aspect that didn’t quite sound realistic was the way Naaman’s wife treated Miriam; she acted as a loving mother, rather than a mistresss talking to a slave. It worked well for the story, though; I’m not sure how the story would have worked the way it did, otherwise. The last thing that didn’t strike us as realistic was when both Miriam and her mistress traveled to Israel with Naaman when he went to request healing from the prophet.

This is a lovely story for, especially, middle-grade girls who like short books with a sweet ending. If you want absolute realism, this is not the book for you. There are some very good points to consider, such as when Miriam’s friend tells her, “We can’t know why this happened. Only Jehovah in His wisdom knows. But—we must be faithful.” Another quote that stood out was when Miriam’s mistress compared Miriam’s life to the weaving she was doing. It was beautiful on top—but if you only saw the underside, it would not appear pretty or even meaningful at all.

There is a study guide available for this book. It includes an interview with the author that offers insight into why she wrote this book and what she hopes to accomplish with it (and the correct pronunciation of her name!). To find the study guide, go to this page and scroll down to the graphic that mentions the teacher’s guide; click on that graphic. There are a number of suggestions for things to research to add to the learning experience. Two Syrian recipes are also in the study guide—they look delicious!

For more people’s opinions of this book, read what the rest of the 45 reviewers had to say by clicking the picture below!

The Heart Changer {Jarm Del Boccio, Author Reviews}

Product Review—Dyslexia Gold

July 2, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Sometimes, we end up being assigned a review that I’m not very excited about. Dyslexia Gold was one of those—but I may end up being thankful for it, anyway. When I filled out the form to indicate my interest in a lifetime subscription for the Dyslexia Gold Full Bundle, I gave it a fairly low interest level, but said that I would be willing to do the review if they needed people. I suspect that Mr. Sweetie has a mild level of dyslexia, so I hoped that if we used this program it would help him. The biggest reason for my hesitation is the fact that it is hard for us to fit computer work into our homeschooling day!

Mr. Sweetie has been playing games on Dyslexia Gold most school days since the middle of April. There are four categories of games, Engaging Eyes, Fluency Builder, Spelling Tutor and Times Table Tutor. I told him to do Engaging Eyes every second time, and choose one of the others for the days in between. Engaging Eyes is supposed to help children’s eyes learn to track better, which is what I suspect to be his biggest struggle with reading. Before he started, I downloaded a couple of stories from his grade level and marked the errors as he read while I timed him. His reading speed at that time was 52 words per minute, with 8 errors per minute. I had him read the same story again yesterday, and his reading speed was 61 words per minute, with only 5 errors per minute. When he was tested by the Dyslexia Gold website, his reading speed on April 14 was 66 words per minute, but by May 27, when they tested him again with a different story, it was 71. So, it looks to me as though this program might be working! Also, I noticed yesterday that he sat down and read a story to Little Miss without any prompting. I am going to have him continue to use this program for awhile, and see if it helps.

Engaging Eyes has several different games to help children be able to read better. The one Mr. Sweetie has used the most is Target Practice. He wears 3-D glasses for this one, which were sent to us in the mail. They make red and blue circles converge and appear to be at different levels, and then he uses keyboard arrows to aim at them and move the “gun” up or down. Whack an Alien teaches children’s eyes to move quickly. Speed Fix flashes several sets of letters, and you are supposed to click if you have seen an “a” in the set. Eye Tracking has letters appearing across the screen, and you’re supposed to click when you see a certain one.

Fluency Builder is mostly a phonics program. It doesn’t seem to have been very helpful here, as I have already put Mr. Sweetie through a couple of intensive phonics programs. Spelling Tutor had him write a sentence on paper, then check it. If he missed a word he had to practice it several times. This didn’t seem very helpful to him, either. The Times Table Tutor, however, I believe, will be quite helpful. Mr. Sweetie is having trouble learning his multiplication facts, and this is a good way to practice them. The main point is to get faster, which is what he needs. I’m planning to have him do this frequently, too. (This photo is of Mr. Sweetie doing Fluency Builder.)

When you log on to Dyslexia Gold, you are given the choice of the four types of games. There is also a tab on that page for reports. That’s where I found Mr. Sweetie’s reading speed from the two times the website tested him. It also tells what level he has reached with each game and how often he has used it.

I don’t know if I can say this program is worth paying money for; I’ll have to have Mr. Sweetie use it longer to know that. I do know he doesn’t complain about doing it, and even seems to enjoy it, which is more than I can say for most of his schoolwork! If you suspect eye problems to be at the root of your child’s reading difficulties, this might be a good program to check into, however.

Dyslexia Gold Full Bundle {Dyslexia Gold Reviews}

Product Review—Pathway to Liberty

May 8, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

I’ve always been quite interested in studying history, and for the past several years have been enjoying looking over various history curricula to compare them. I’m always looking for the perfect history course, and have pretty well come to the conclusion that I’ll never find exactly what I’m looking for. I keep looking, though, because it’s interesting to see what people put together. When the opportunity came up to review a course offered by Pathway to Liberty Homeschool Curriculum, I decided I would like to check out one of their levels. I chose Year One, Universal History of Pathway to Liberty’s History Curriculum, the first of four years that take students of all ages through the entire scope of world history. I chose this level because one of the first books studied in this level is one that I have been wanting to study with my children, and also because, when I’m comparing history courses, I like to look at the beginning of time.

Pathway to Liberty level 1

Universal History starts with Genesis 1. After studying the first 11 chapters of Genesis in some depth, we will move on to studying the ancient civilizations. After studying Abraham, a couple of weeks are devoted to Egypt, and then the main focus is the history of the Old Testament, spending a little time with Babylonia and Persia as they enter Biblical history. A couple of weeks of the history of Greece wrap up the year.

So far, we have gotten through the first four weeks of this course. I requested two of the four levels, so I have Mr. Diligence doing Level Two and Mr. Sweetie and Mr. Imagination doing Level One. Level One is intended for K5-3^rd grade. Mr. Sweetie is in 4^th grade, but struggles enough with writing that I decided the lower level would be best for him. Level Two is for 4th-6^th grade; Mr. Diligence is in 8^th grade, but he, too, struggles enough with academics that I thought the lower level would be a better fit for him. (Levels Three and Four are for grades 7-9 and 10-12, respectively; they do the same reading and watch the same YouTube videos as Level Two, but do more in-depth research and writing.) Levels One and Two are quite different, but at the same time they correlate well with each other. For the first three weeks, Level One was a study of the days of creation and the character of God. Meanwhile, in Level Two, Mr. Diligence watched a video on YouTube each week and we began working our way through Ruth Beechick’s Genesis: Finding Our Roots, which I had been wanting to study ever since I borrowed it from a friend a few years ago. In Week Four, we all started studying Noah, and the younger ones are studying In the Days of Noah with me (I make Mr. Diligence sit in on reading that one, too!). One thing Level One includes that the older ones don’t is coloring pictures for nearly every lesson. My boys didn’t want to do them, but Little Miss loved coloring several. She also loved helping to make this poster of the days of Creation. I’ve wanted to do something like this for a long time, but it’s something that I don’t get done without something pushing for it to happen, like this review.

I have really enjoyed this study, so much so that I plan to go through the rest of the course that we were given. The boys grumble about taking time to do it, but they are learning and enjoying what they learn all the same. One thing we picked up on when we were reading the Book of Adam, from the 2nd-4^th chapters of Genesis, was that the tone of the writing is that of an eyewitness. I was reading chapter 2 aloud, and Mr. Intellectual challenged me on what he heard; he was sure I had misread something. When he looked it up in the Bible, however, we were all rather excited as we talked about the rivers of the Garden of Eden. The wording could hardly have been anything other than an eyewitness account—read it for yourself if you’re dubious. Then, of course, as we worked our way through Beechick’s book, we came to that same conclusion.

The videos we have watched so far on Pathway to Liberty’s YouTube channel have been good. The first few didn’t really stand out, but the one we watched for Week Four about Noah and the world that perished, which we watched all together one evening as a family, was absolutely fascinating. The younger children probably didn’t get much out of it, but we stopped it to discuss points with the older ones a couple of times. I’m looking forward to seeing what comes up in the future!

This curriculum is available either as hard copies or digital. I received the digital copies, which means I can print as many as I want for my children. I three-hole punched the paper, then tied the books together with yarn, which is working well.

One part of this course we have done some, but not as much as recommended, is word studies. The recommendation is to choose five words every day to find definitions for from the Webster’s Dictionary 1828. We have done a few, but not that many. We also haven’t done the writing assignments recommended. We could go to a lot more depth with this study. It could easily replace a lot of Language Arts, tying it together with history, which would be great. I just don’t have the energy for that right now!

My conclusion about this history course? So far, it is very good. It looks like the entire year that we were given is going to be great. Looking ahead farther, I would guess that I, personally, would not do well with the slant of the year in which American History is studied; having moved away from the United States I don’t share the same view of US history that it looks like this author has. However, I do greatly appreciate the way she ties history into the Biblical framework. The study we did in Level One about the character of God was absolutely great. I will admit that it was hard to figure out what answers she was wanting for some of the questions; if I hadn’t had the answer key handy for the first three weeks of that level, I would have had no idea how to answer some of the questions.

Be sure to read some of the reviews that other people have written! All four years of this curriculum have been use and reviewed by various families, so there will be a lot of different points-of-view. If you’re looking for a Bible-based history course, this may be one you want to check into.

Universal History, The Middle Ages, US History & World History Curriculum {Pathway to Liberty Homeschool Curriculum Reviews}