Book Review

Book Review—Justified Means

January 14, 2021 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

About the Book

Book: Justified Means
Author: Chautona Havig
Genre: Christian Suspense
Release date: January 7, 2013

How could she not be terrified?

When Erika Polowski is abducted from her bed and held captive without explanation, she has one goal. Get away before they kill her.

Keith Auger’s job as an agent is to keep Erika safe—even if it means keeping her locked in an abandoned cabin in the middle of nowhere. At gunpoint.

What should be a routine “involuntary extraction” goes south when someone finds out where they’re hiding. Add to that a coworker with a chip on her shoulder and too many unexplained “accidents,” and it all adds up to one unlikely, terrifying explanation.

There’s a mole in The Agency.

He’s promised to protect her, but can Erika trust a man whose job it is to hold people against their wills? Does his deep faith make it any better or just a whole lot creepier.

And just who wants Erika dead anyway?

The Agency Files: They’ll do whatever it takes to keep their clients safe. Period.

Grab this first book in the series today.

My Thoughts:

I first read Justified Means a few years ago. I remember turning pages about as fast as I could, to find out what happened to Erika. Would she be all right in the end, or would whoever was after her catch up? Who was supplying information of her whereabouts to the wrong people? When I reread the book for this review tour, I knew she had escaped, so didn’t “have” to read so fast, and I enjoyed all the little details that Chautona included. (For a better review, read the one I wrote after I read the book the first time, here.)

I received a free copy of this book from the author, and these are my honest thoughts about 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 at chautona.com and say howdy—if you can remember how to spell her name.

More From Chautona:

Isn’t That Idea a Bit Crazy and Farfetched?

Black ops teams. They’re the stuff of TV shows and movies. I have no doubt such things exist—military groups that have to exist and work outside the normal scheme of things to give those who answer to the public plausible deniability or some such thing.

Then one of those “what if?” questions hit me. They’re an occupational hazard, those “what if?” questions. They appear out of nowhere and start crazy thoughts in your head. Ones like, “What if a private company existed to do things that couldn’t be tied to the government in any way—no money exchanged?”

What if sometimes a protection company had to work outside the law in order to do the job they needed to do? What if that meant they might just have to abduct someone to save his or her life?

Those of course led to the granddaddy of all questions. What if that someone didn’t appreciate being saved?

The Agency was born and with it their motto: Whatever it takes.

That’s what they’ll do to keep their clients safe. Only the wealthy can afford their services. Some of the poorest of the poor receive them. But it always boils down to one primary goal. Protect their clients at all costs.

Even if the client doesn’t want protection.

Is the idea a bit crazy and far-fetched? Yeah… probably. But I wouldn’t be surprised to discover there are similar agencies out there, and if there are, I hope they save lives with the sort of compassion my guys have.

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Book Review—What You Said to Me

December 3, 2020 by NZ Filbruns 3 Comments

About the Book

Book: What You Said to Me
Author: Olivia Newport
Genre: Christian Fiction
Release Date: November 2020

Book 4 in the Tree of Life Series: A Father-Daughter Genealogy Team Link Faith Journeys on Family Trees

When 15-year-old Tisha Crowder gets caught shoplifting, attorney Nolan Duffy tries to protect her from consequences that could rattle her already troubled life. His daughter, Jillian, feels like she’s the one being punished instead—by having Tisha assigned to work with her on a backlog of genealogy files. Tisha doesn’t seem interested in taking the job seriously, and Jillian’s patience wears thin. Besides, everyone in Canyon Mines knows the Crowder family has experienced generations of brokenness. Then a sliver of hope turns up in long-ago words in plain sight, challenging shrouded assumptions about Tisha’s family. Now Jillian is the one who can walk with Tisha back to 1893 and uncover where everything went wrong in the first place—and save her from the past.

What You Said to Me is the fourth book in the Tree of Life series by Olivia Newport. You’ll want to return to the lovely Colorado mountain town of Canyon Mines again and again to explore and celebrate unforgettable family stories that will inspire you to connect with your own family histories and unique faith journeys.

My Thoughts:

I’ve been reading the Tree of Life series since the first one was published. I have enjoyed all of them, but they keep getting better and better. Each one features Jillian, a genealogist, who meets a troubled person and unravels their family tree to find out why they react the way they do to things that happen. In the first two books, it felt somewhat forced, but the third and fourth felt a lot more natural. I especially liked this fourth book, What You Said to Me.

Jillian is stunned when Nolan, her father, informs her that she needs a helper—and furthermore, the helper is arriving now. Yes, she knows that the dining table is buried under piles and piles of old folders that need to be organized for the project she’s been hired to do—but surely she can handle this without 15-year-old Tisha Crowder’s help? And Tisha’s attitude doesn’t make it any easier. What is behind the girl’s attitudes and actions, anyway?

The story flips back and forth between Jillian, Nolan and Tisha, in Canyon Mines, Colorado, in the present, and a family in 1893 Denver. I found myself caught up in both stories, eager to see how the two intersected. I also wanted to see if there was any way that Jillian could help Tisha out of the generations of bitterness, anger, and distrust that plagued her family and caused her problems. Nolan was sure she could—but how?

One thing I really like about this series is that there isn’t a lot of romance. There is a little, in the third book and also in this one, but it’s a very minor element. A few kisses were alluded to, but not much more. I also enjoy Nolan and his cooking and opera singing! He’s a very fun character. There is not a strong Christian message, but the story is very clean and reflects a Christian worldview. As I said to begin, I really enjoyed this book, and I’m looking forward to the next one. There are loose ends from books three and four that have not been tied up yet!

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

About the Author:

Olivia Newport’s novels twist through time to find where faith and passions meet. Her husband and twentysomething children provide welcome distraction from the people stomping through her head on their way into her books. She chases joy in stunning Colorado at the foot of Pikes Peak.

More From Olivia:

Careful Words

“You didn’t just say that.” Or, “I can’t believe you said that.”

Have you ever said that in retort to someone whose comment offended or wounded? I know I have. But what cuts me even more deeply is when I say to myself, “I can’t believe I just said that.”

The words of a parent at wit’s end, a spouse harboring hurt, a friend saddened by misunderstanding, an employee feeling undercut—they have all been my words. And they came out too fast to swallow back before they did their damage.

I hope I have also had the words of a parent who set aside busyness to listen, a spouse offering loving encouragement, a friend checking in with someone going through a tough patch, a coworker curious to see how I could help rather than compete. Those are the kinds of words I’ve never regretted, never had to repent of, never had to do rebuild from.

I certainly didn’t write What You Said to Me because I think I get it right all the time or even most of the time. Far from it! In our culture of rushing and achieving and—let’s face it, sometimes just getting through the demands of the day—sometimes our words are the last thing we are careful with. Yet they have the longest lasting consequence in our relationships and families—sometimes for generations. The dual-timeline story traces how words that injure became a pattern in one family line until one girl finally fought back to find healing for her future.

My challenge for myself, and all who read What You Said to Me, is to be the person who speaks healing words of hope so that “I can’t believe you said that” becomes “Thank you for saying that.”

If you have a particularly poignant experience of how another’s words impacted you, I’d love to hear from you.

Olivia Newport

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Book Review—Bells of New Cheltenham

November 20, 2020 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

About the Book

Book: The Bells of New Cheltenham
Author: Chautona Havig
Genre: Christian fiction, Christmas romance
Release Date: October 15, 2020

Who knew that Christmas carols were love songs?

Justine Driscoll sure didn’t. Peace on earth? She’s heard of that. Holy and joyful? Something about that, too. But love songs sung by a bride about the birth of her bridegroom? That’s just weird stuff right there.

Weird or not, though, once Justine decides to enter a short story contest using a Christmas carol as the inspiration, she discovers love in the carols she investigates, in the story an ex-Army guy tells, and in the little tourist town of New Cheltenham.

“But what do the words mean?”

Ken Torsney is used to fighting for causes he believes in. He just never imagined he’d go from Army “warrior” to spiritual warrior in the span of one question from a stranger. Justine is like no girl he’s ever known— hungry for the gospel even as she rejects it.

He’s falling for her, and that’s bound to break his heart.

Love is in the air in New Cheltenham this Christmas. Again.

My Thoughts:

A couple of years ago, Chautona wrote The Ghosts of New Cheltenham, which involved Mitchell being required to tell a ghost story in order to get his inheritance. The Bells of New Cheltenham has a much nicer theme! I enjoyed reading it as it was written, and again after it was all done.

Mitchell entered the ghost story telling competition two years in a row; this year he can’t bring himself to enter. What can he do instead? He has a bright idea: Sponsor a different kind of contest! His idea is simple; the contestants are to write a short story based on a Christmas carol. He prints up flyers and posters and gets the word around town.

Justine wanders into town with all her possessions on her back. She listens to the carolers going around the streets singing one Christmas carol after another, and then sees the flyer about the short story contest. It catches her attention, even though she knows nothing about the Bible, Christmas, or Christianity. Ken, one of the carolers, notices her interest in the carols and offers to tell her the story behind the one she thinks sounded quite depressing. She wants to hear the whole story, even though she is trying to reject it. Ken, finding himself very attracted to her, knows he has to be careful not to fall in love with someone who isn’t a Christian—but he very much wants to spend time with her and answer all her questions about Jesus and the whole Christmas story! Meanwhile, she must win that contest—it would solve all her problems!

This is a great story with a unique premise. Chautona has carefully woven the entire story of why Jesus came to earth into this story, without being at all preachy. You must read this story about how Justine discovered love in everything around her. It’s delightful! Oh, and the scene in Chapter 8 where Ken talks about buying weed? It makes me laugh out loud every time I read it! (About four times now, since after I read it aloud to one son he wanted me to read it to the rest. I could hardly read, for laughing so hard.)

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

About the Author:

More From Chautona:

3 Things That Make My Christmas Heart Sing

I didn’t have a ghost of a chance.

The message popped up in my messenger at exactly the moment I sat down. This is significant, because I get dozens of Facebook messages every day, and often, they get buried when a new one supersedes it. So, as you can see, it’s a near miracle that I ever saw the message at all.

The message offered me a spot in a collection of novellas—a Christmas collection. Yep. Not a ghost of a chance.

Still, I tried to be responsible, you know? After all, I had quite a few books due at the same time already. Bookers on the Rocks, The Last Gasp, my Christmas Lights Collection “noella,” and my CrossRoads Collection “noella.” And those didn’t include anything I wanted to write in spring or summer.

Then she added another layer of temptation. This collection had a theme. That theme? Christmas carol inspired romances.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love music, Christmas, and specifically, Christmas music?

The other authors in the set had already made their carol selections. She sent a list of those that had already been claimed. I read them with great trepidation. See, I already had two carols I’d want to use in the story for this collection that I hadn’t even agreed to participate in yet.

No one had chosen “The Holly and the Ivy” or “The Bells on Christmas Day.”

That ghost slowly transformed into the ghost of my resistance.

All that remained was for me to come up with a story idea. I mean, why join a collection if you can’t even decide what to do with it?

That’s when it happened.

There’s always this moment when the first idea germinates, sprouts, and pushes up through the fertile soil of my imagination. My favorite moment. And it hit me. What if the theme for the collection was my story idea? My character could enter a contest that requires a short story based on a Christmas carol.

And once I had that idea, the rest came in a whoosh! Mitchell, from The Ghosts of New Cheltenham could be sick to death of this annual ghost storytelling contest and decide to create his own contest. And then… well…

The Bells of New Cheltenham was born.

If you’ve not read The Ghosts of New Cheltenham, you’ll follow this “noella” just fine. It is meant to be a stand-alone. However, if you want a richer reading experience, I recommend reading The Ghosts of New Cheltenham, followed by the companion short story, “The Ghastly Therapist” first. Both are available through Kindle Unlimited. Additionally, if you send your receipt (or a screenshot of the final page of the eBook from Kindle Unlimited) for the Melodies of Christmas Love collection to chautona@chautona.com, I’ll send YOU the bonus short story—the one Justine Driscoll writes in this “noella.”

But I promised to tell you three things that make my heart sing at Christmas.

The way people are often just a little kinder and a little more giving and understanding.
The joy that seems to fill every part of life—family, friends, parties, presents, church services, reading, singing…
The music that plays everywhere—and often sings of a Savior’s love.

What makes your heart sing at Christmas?

To purchase your copy, click here.

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Product Review—Progeny Press

July 10, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Disclaimer: I received a FREE copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in
exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I
compensated in any other way.

I first heard of the study guides from Progeny Press before I even had children. Back then, I had never even heard of using anything for school except proper “schoolbooks,” and the idea of reading a story book and studying it was quite a novel idea to me. I wanted to see what these study guides were like, but never had the chance to look at them until they were offered for review recently. I had the choice of study guides for several books, and chose A New Coat for Anna Study Guide. We don’t have the picture book A New Coat for Anna, but I was able to find it in an online library we use, which made it possible to study the book.

A New Coat for Anna is a delightful story about a little girl who needed a new coat, which was unavailable in the years right after World War II in Europe. I read the story to Mr. Sweetie (age 10), Mr. Imagination (age 8) and Little Miss (age 5), and then we worked through the study guide together. One of the advantages of the downloadable PDF, besides the fact that it is immediately available, is that I was able to print just the pages we actually needed, and as many copies as we needed. Little Miss doesn’t read or write yet, but the other two do, so they each had a set of the pages. We started out by finding definitions for some of the words from the story and writing them down, and then answered questions about the story. The children enjoyed taking their measurements the same way the tailor in the story took Anna’s measurements for her new coat. (Mr. Sweetie was delighted that he is still a little bit bigger than Mr. Imagination!)

After several pages of questions about the story, we did a study of patience. We talked about how Anna and her mother had to have patience, and about some times that we needed to have patience. We also talked about the qualities of a noble woman, from Proverbs 31, and how Anna’s mother displayed those qualities. To wrap up the study, the suggestion is made to have a party like Anna and her mother did in the story. We didn’t do that, but one of my boys wants to make the cake that is suggested! We did do the activity at the end of the study guide. To do it, the boys had to find the missing words in sentences from the story, and then find the words in the word search. At the very end are suggestions for more books to read, by the same author and of related interest.

This guide was laid out very well. It was based on a very interesting story, which my children loved reading. The questions were good ones, and I liked the studies of patience and the noble woman. The study made my children think, but they enjoyed doing something different. I will be happy to use more of these guides in the future; they make a nice change of pace from our normal schoolwork. To read the opinions of 64 other families, click on the image below.

Study Guides for Literature - A New Coat for Anna, In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson, My Side of the Mountain, Animal Farm & Little Women {Progeny Press Reviews}

Product Review—Everyday Education, LLC

May 6, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

I don’t know about anyone else, but it seems like writing, and penmanship in general, are very difficult to teach to boys. They just aren’t interested! I struggle to get them to write at all, let alone legibly. Therefore, I was somewhat interested in using Perfect Reading, Beautiful Handwriting ebook from Everyday Education, LLC. The premise sounded great—a simple method for teaching beautiful handwriting, and good reading. I thought I would use it to supplement the Language Arts program we’re using with the boys, and get a start on teaching Little Miss to read and write with it.

When I received the ebook, I was quite interested in reading the introductory pages. The history of our current type of cursive handwriting was fascinating, and I like the premise of this book, which is to simplify writing so that everyone can have beautiful handwriting. I believe the book would work to teach a child to read, as well, assuming the child had no learning disabilities and the mother had enough time to spend with them doing the lessons. For me, unfortunately, it didn’t work well.

I did not end up using this course as a supplement for my boys. This book teaches Italic writing, which is beautiful and simple, but they had already learned the normal cursive. Therefore, I felt like it would be too confusing for them to try to relearn everything. I did use it for Little Miss, to work on letter formation. She loved doing several pages of the letters, and did very well at learning the sounds. Each letter is given a picture of a word that begins with that sound—like A is apple, E is elephant, I is igloo, etc. We didn’t get beyond writing letters, though. The program doesn’t start putting letters together into words until all the letters have been learned. Then, it introduces short vowel words, consonant blends, compound words and plural words. It then moves on to vowel-R words and vowel teams. Each of these lessons has a list of words to learn to read, and then several sentences using the words. Each of the sentences is printed with blank lines under the words for practice writing. This is one of the strengths I see in this book, that the child is expected to write directly below the example, which makes it easy to follow the model.

After thoroughly learning the shapes of the letters, children are introduced to joining them. With the Italic system, most of the letters are actually not joined, as in most cursive systems. I found that quite interesting.

In summary, this book was not a good fit for our family at this time, both because I have already taught my boys to write cursive with a different system and because of the dyslexia that runs in our family. In the introduction, this book states that everyone will be able to read well by going through this system, but I know from experience that some people will not be able to—at least not with someone like me teaching them. I tried systems like this with my older boys and utterly failed, although I’m sure some people would have done well with it. This book would work well to teach most children to read and write, however, and if I didn’t already have a course on hand to use with Little Miss I would give this one a try. Take a look at it and see what you think!

Fifty families have been using Perfect Reading, Beautiful Handwriting over the past month and a half; see what they have to say about it by clicking the image below!

Perfect Reading, Beautiful Handwriting ebook {Everyday Education, LLC Reviews}

Book Review—A House With Holes

January 9, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Book: A House with Holes
Author: Denise Mast Broadwater
Genre: Christian Memoir, Marriage
Release Date: October, 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.

Seasoned renovators Greg and Denise Broadwater dream of owning and restoring a historic home in downtown Charleston, South Carolina. What follows are six years of unimaginable challenges and successes concerning the renovation of their condemned 1920s Charleston Cottage, their place in a transitional neighborhood on Congress Street, and their thirty-year marriage.

In a community that struggles to feel like home, alongside normal stressors of full-time work and family weddings, the heightened tension taxes the Broadwaters to the brink. Nothing is left untouched in their hundred-year-old cottage full of architectural and historical details, from the rotted floorboards to the hole in the roof and the knob-and-tube wiring that causes a fire. But through Denise’s fascinating memoir, A House with Holes, the Christian author and therapist shares how she and her craftsman-architect husband strengthened the holes in both their home and their relationship during this wearying time in order to survive and thrive.

Using Broadwater’s counseling experience, marriage principles have been woven seamlessly into the text, demonstrating ways to maintain relationships in the midst of struggles. Reflective questions close each chapter so that readers may ponder their own relationships with growth and understanding.

My Thoughts:

When I look at books that are available for review, one of the first things I look at is the genre. I really enjoy memoirs. When I saw that A House With Holes was not only a memoir but also a book about marriage, I was quite intrigued. The topic of the memoir is unusual, as well. How many stories have you heard about restoring old houses? This one happens to be in Charleston, which is not a common setting, either.

Denise Broadwater, a counselor, and her husband shared a dream, a dream of owning a house in Charleston, South Carolina. In order to afford one, they had to buy the type of house that most of us wouldn’t look at twice—a small cottage with a leaky roof and rotting floors. Because of local regulations, the house needed to be restored to its original condition, a project that took much more time than the couple had expected! Along the way, they experienced many challenges, such as a brick through a window, a raccoon in the kitchen, and walls or floors missing at times. Every so often, Denise reached a point where she felt like she couldn’t take any more—and to tell the truth, I’m not sure I would have been able to handle the conditions she was living in!

Throughout the book, Denise includes sidebars with advice for marriage. Each of these is quite thought-provoking, and would be good for me to go back to and ponder often. One that especially spoke to me talked about regulating our response to triggers. The advice she gives is very good! Many chapters also end with several questions about relationships, helping me, as the reader, to search myself and find ways to improve my marriage.

I could identify with the author in so many ways! One in particular that stood out was when she exclaimed to her husband, “When does this ever get better? Over thirty years, and we are still fighting the same battles!” We haven’t been married that long, but I find myself struggling with some of the same things I always have! I am happy that I had the chance to read this book, and recommend it to anyone who likes to read advice for marriage in the context of a person’s life story.

About the Author:

Denise Mast Broadwater is a licensed professional counselor in South Carolina, treating anxiety, depression, life adjustments, and marriages. She began her career as a family therapist working with at-risk families and youth. Previously, she was an elementary teacher in private education. She is a wife and the mother of three children and recently became a grandmother. She enjoys rowing at the gym, cooking new recipes, sewing quilts, and blogging at Life Lights Blog (emptynestmarriage.com) and Charleston Renovator Blog (www.freedmanscottagerenovation.blogspot.com).

More About A House With Holes

Marriage comes with the struggle of making life work—but with a promise of home, a place to rest, to be who we are in all our mess, to feel loved and accepted in the truth of who we are. Opening up our mess means adjusting to our anxieties, habits, and struggles.

We all know marriage can be tough. Marriage requires commitment and flexibility, allowing for each spouse to develop his and her own gifts, to work together through challenges, and to communicate in a way that draws the couple closer through any issues that arise. The same can practically be said for renovating a house—especially an old house.

In A House with Holes: One Marriage Journey in a Charleston Renovation, author and therapist Denise Broadwater shares the challenges and successes of the restoration she and her craftsman-architect husband embraced after their purchase of a 1920s Charleston Cottage that was slated for destruction. Oddly enough, the project began to mirror the ups and downs of their empty-nester marital relationship.

Through this intriguing memoir describing the architectural style and details of their historic home on Congress Street in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, Denise shares her struggles and disappointments during the six-year upheaval. They lived with open holes in the floors and roof, wild critters, and in an old neighborhood that was unsure of their intentions. As her attitude changed with her living situation, Denise discovered her marriage rising to meet the challenges they faced and this struggling community opening to become a place of belonging.

“All marriages have holes—that’s a given,” Denise says. “The holes are places you disconnect: a container for selfishness, for disappointment, and for addictions as people try to find alternatives for unmet needs. Intimacy opens up the holes. Growing means making small movements toward each other, coming together to reduce friction.”

Principles and questions about marriage have been worked seamlessly into each chapter so that readers can “shore up” their own relationships and grow in understanding while

vicariously watching the progress of the Charleston Cottage through the eyes of a seasoned DIY renovator.

The Broadwaters’ experience of doing life in the midst of a major house renovation demonstrates marriage recovery, and her expertise as a counselor shapes lessons for married people everywhere in an honest, easy-reading, and relatable telling.

I have read more than my share of books about relationships, but A House with Holes is refreshingly different. Reading this book feels like binging on a Netflix series because you have to see what happens next. Denise is a therapist who has an in-depth understanding of relationships, and she has invited you to have a front-row seat to view what it took to create an amazing marriage while undertaking an almost impossible renovation.

—Dr. Larry Wagner, PhD, professor of counseling,

Columbia International University, Columbia, South Carolina

To purchase your copy, click here.

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Book Review—Volition

January 2, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

I was scrolling through Facebook a few days ago, and saw a post from my favorite author, Chautona Havig. She had suddenly decided to pull out a manuscript from many years ago, rewrite it, and get it published—in three days! I offered to help her with proofreading. I had absolutely no idea what the book was about, and was quite startled when I started reading Volition (What kind of a title is that, anyway? It gives no clues about the content!). This was a sci-fi, time travel book! I don’t read that kind of book; sci-fi doesn’t interest me at all, and time travel is so unbelievable I have quit reading those books, too. Well, I had offered to help proofread, so I kept on…and on…and on. I couldn’t put this book down, and I loved it!

Andi had enough drama in her life to suit anyone, with a suicidal roommate. She also has a wonderful, loving family and is looking forward to her wedding in six months. Then, she wakes up in something that looks like an airplane and discovers that she has been abducted by people from the future to be somebody’s wife. (They intended to rescue her roommate.) What will she do now—especially when she sees what will happen to her friend after she’s out of the picture? If she goes back, an innocent person will be doomed to death; if she stays, she will never see her family again.

This book will really make you think. There are several important themes that are touched on. Andi has to grapple with her faith and who God is. She also has to work through what God says about divorce, and about marriage—and how to do marriage! I really appreciated the study of marriage and divorce that is worked into this story. Even though this is the kind of story that I don’t believe is possible, it’s quite the engrossing story and a great vehicle for conveying truths about God and life. If you read this book, you won’t soon forget it!

I received a free copy of this book from the author, and these are my honest thoughts about it. The link to buy the book is Esther’s affiliate link.

WARNING: The story opens with an attempted suicide.

Buy a copy of the book here.

Book Review—All is Bright

December 19, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

Book: All Is Bright (Christmas Lights Collection 2019)
Author: Kari Trumbo, Toni Shiloh, Cathe Swanson, & Chautona Havig
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: October 17, 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.

Four of your favorite contemporary romance authors join festive forces to bring you the fourth-annual Christmas Lights Collection.

Kari Trumbo- Merry and Dashing: Merry hates Christmas corporate greed. Jacob loves finding the perfect gift for everyone. When Scrooge and Santa volunteer at a local thrift store together, will the mix be Holly Jolly?

Toni Shiloh- I’ll Be Home: What could be worse than being laid off right before the holidays? For Starr Lewis that would include returning home jobless, single, and, oh yeah, just in time to attend her sister’s wedding on Christmas Eve… to Starr’s ex-boyfriend. In the midst of it all, her brother’s best friend soon has her wondering if she can take another chance on love.

Cathe Swanson- Season of Change: Charlea’s ready to sell Serenity Hill, but Drew is back in town, 15 years after their dream date ended in disaster, helping her mother and daughter turn the old commune into a commercial Christmas wonderland. Between poinsettias and sleigh rides, angst and romance collide in this Christmas second-chance romance!

Chautona Havig- The 12 Dates of Christmas : When Reagan runs into Alex, her high school nemesis, he is stunned to discover that’s how she saw him. It’ll take twelve dates and a lot of forgiveness on both sides to even hope for a Christmassy-ever-after.

Brighten your day with these four heart-warming novellas today!

My Thoughts:

As with all the other Christmas Lights collections, there were stories included that I liked very well, and some that I didn’t enjoy quite so much. With two of my favorite authors included in the collection each year, though, I don’t want to miss out on this collection!

The first book in the collection is Merry and Dashing, by Kari Trumbo. To be honest, I didn’t get much out of this one. Merry hates Christmas because of the greed and commercialization of the holiday. Her mother suggests that she do some volunteer work because Merry spent almost all her time at home by herself, so she went to the local thrift shop. Between that and her work as a web designer, she got to know Jacob. Could he help her learn to enjoy Christmas?

Toni Shiloh’s I’ll Be Home is next. I’m sorry, but I didn’t finish this one. I simply struggle with this author’s style. If you enjoy sweet romances with lots of kisses, you’ll enjoy this.

I believe that Season of Change, by Cathe Swanson, is my favorite in this collection. There is a romance in it, but it’s so low-key that I didn’t even pay much attention to it till late in the story. Other elements were much more important. I found the interactions between Charlea, her mother, and her daughter, the stresses between them, and how they resolved their issues, very well-done. I loved the setting of a lot of the story, too—a former hippie commune on which Pamela, Charlea’s mother, was the sole remaining resident. I really like Cathe’s writing style, and the thought and care she puts into her books. She spends the time to really make them shine.

The last book in this collection is Chautona Havig’s 12 Dates of Christmas. Reagan came home from her job with a film company, to spend a month with her family. Who should she run into on one of her first days but Alex, her nemesis in high school! She agrees to a date with him—only on condition that he apologize for something he did to her in high school, which means he has to remember something. Between both of them working through the offenses he caused (unknowingly for the most part) back then, and her challenges getting along with her older brother now, there are a lot of little gems about forgiveness in this otherwise fluffy book!

About the Author:

Kari Trumbo: Kari Trumbo writes swoony heroes and places that become characters with detail and heart. Kari loves reading, listening to music, singing when no one’s listening, and curling up with a fuzzy blanket, a book, and a hot cup of tea by the wood stove. She loves her make-believe people almost as much as the real thing. You can find out more about her and her worlds at karitrumbo.com

Toni Shiloh: Toni Shiloh writes ethnically diverse characters that could be your best friend. She writes to understand the Lord more and shares her lessons with her readers. Visit her at www.tonishiloh.com.

Cathe Swanson: Cathe Swanson, the author of the Great Lakes and Glory Quilts series, enjoys gardening, sewing, papercrafting, and kayaking on the beautiful Wisconsin rivers. As a child of the 60’s, she’s having fun writing about hippies and the Jesus People movement in her new Serenity Hill series.

Chautona Havig: 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 at chautona.com

More From Chautona:

Christmas in “The Christmas City”

I wrote most of 12 Dates of Christmas in Noel, Missouri, otherwise known as “The Christmas City.” That’s kind of funny, because Noel isn’t pronounced No-ell. It’s “Nole”—rhymes with pole. As in North.

By the time I’d finished, it was almost time to leave the little town and head home after nearly six weeks with old and new friends. I had to say goodbye to memories I might never visit in person again, and it was difficult to imagine.

So, I did the only thing I knew to do. I wrote a super-short story. It’s just over seven thousand words (including a bit of history behind different people, places, and things in the story), but it captured things near and dear to my heart—my mother’s house, the church I’ve loved for so many years, town traditions, and now characters I’m not sure I can let go of.

In fact, I am considering writing a full-length novella next year for the fifth-annual Christmas Lights Collection next year! I think Rob and Lissa deserve to have their full story told.

As my thanks to readers who purchase or read the collection on Kindle Unlimited, I’m offering this short story, “A Noel Christmas,” FREE. Just send me your receipt or a screenshot showing you’ve completed the collection and it’s yours. Visit https://chautona.com/bonus for more information or just zip an email to any of the authors in the collection. We’re all happy to send it on.

We all hope you have a very meaningful Christmas this year—one that offers bright spots in your days. May God richly bless you now and in the new year.

Kari Trumbo, Toni Shiloh, Cathe Swanson, and Chautona Havig

P.S. If you read the short story, do let me know if you think I should turn it into a full-length novella/novel. I’d love to know your opinion.

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—Christmas on Breakers Point

December 12, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Book: Christmas on Breakers Point
Author: Chautona Havig
Genre: Christian Contemporary Fiction, Christian Romantic Fiction, Christmas

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.

One man’s last Christmas wish might change two lives forever.

Mallory Barrows has one last Christmas with her uncle. She’s determined to make it the best one he’s ever had.

She knows when she asks what he wants as his final gift, it won’t be a tie or a new mug. He won’t need those where he’s going, and he’s quite happy about that.

Mallory just didn’t think he wanted a miracle wrapped in paper and tied with a shiny red bow!

Christmas on Breakers Point is the introductory book to the Independence Islands Series.

My Thoughts:

Sometimes a book surprises me with the depth of thought that is contained inside it. When I think of Christmas fiction, I usually think of a light, fluffy romance. Christmas on Breakers Point does not quite fit into that description. Yes, there is a romance included, but it is certainly not the main point of this story.

Mallory received the call just before Thanksgiving: Uncle Bud was nearing the end of his battle with cancer, and he needed her to be with him during his final weeks. She unhesitatingly dropped her job and took off for the Islands to care for him. Her next question: What could she do for a Christmas gift for him? He wouldn’t need a tie or a mug, that was sure. When he asked her for a miracle, though, what could she possibly do?

Mallory did her best, speaking God’s words into the life of her friend who needed the miracle. What had turned Joanie away from Jesus, anyway? Or, was Uncle Bud right, that she had “lost faith in her faith”? How could Mallory tell her the truth she needed to hear, in such a way that she could hear it? Would the miracle happen in time, before Uncle Bud’s expiration date arrived?

In this book, Chautona has tackled some pretty tough topics. Is social justice incompatible with being a Christian? What about environmentalism? Can someone passionate about these issues live for Jesus, as well? Or is it one or the other? When church people don’t seem to care about underprivileged people, does that mean Jesus means nothing? Lots of toes will get stepped on in this book!

This story is the introduction to a new series (I think I saw that there will be 30 books in the series eventually, by a number of different authors!), all set in the Islands, which are off the coast of the Southeastern states, I believe. It will be interesting to see how the books all fit together!

One last little detail I enjoyed: My husband and I spent our honeymoon in the Outer Banks, and one thing I remember noticing there was the sea oats that grew along the dunes. They are mentioned in chapter 4—just a fun little thing for me!

WARNING: Uncle Bud uses the word blasted several times.

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.

More From Chautona:

The book opens with a phone call that goes like this:

Her phone buzzed. Without taking her eyes from the page, Mallory Barrows fumbled about until her hand closed around it. The book held her bound in ropes of suspense as the villain slipped into the party unannounced—unseen. While she followed him around the edge of the imaginary room, her thumb swiped, tapped, and answered the call as if on autopilot.

Even as Mallory said, “Hello?” her breath caught. The guy had found his prey.

“Mallory, honey?”

Without a second look, she dropped the book and sat up, feet planted firmly on the floor and all attention on the call. “Is it time?”

“’Fraid so, darlin’. Doc says it’s a matter of weeks or a month or two. And I promised.”

“I’ll be there Friday afternoon.”

Just days after I wrote those lines, I woke up to a message from my sister. “Call Mom.”

I called. Mom said, “I need you to come.” That was Thursday. I walked into Mom’s house on Saturday evening and our lives changed forever.

I don’t know if God prepared me for this change by having me write that scene just days before, but I have to say it felt like it! Everything went crazy for over a month as I tried to wrap up my mother’s affairs in Missouri, I had to try to finish three books in a time of upheaval and turmoil. No, it’s not the same as trying to help a young woman reclaim her True First Love so she could reclaim her first earthy love. It isn’t the same as starting a whole new life and a new business. But… oh, how it felt like it.

Another parallel in the story and my life was how Mallory struggles to try to get Uncle Bud to eat. I did the same thing for most of my time in Missouri. Mom struggled and hard just to swallow and just wanted to eat. So, while I was writing, I worked hard to come up with a recipe that Mallory might use to convince Uncle Bud to eat something. The result were these Coconut Lime Cookies. I hope you love them as much as Uncle Bud did.

Coconut Lime Cookies

Ingredients:

2 ¼ cups white flour

½ tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

½ tsp salt

1 cup shredded coconut

1 cup sugar

3 oz room temp cream cheese—cubed

½ tsp vanilla

Zest of 1 lime (key limes may be preferred)

½ cup (1 stick) melted butter (warm)

1 egg

1 TBS milk (whole is the most delicious… and half & half is even better)

1 TBS lime juice (again, some may prefer key limes)

½ cup powdered sugar (reserved for rolling cookies in)

Directions: (oven preheats to 350)

Stir together the first five ingredients in a medium mixing bowl. Set aside

Stir together sugar, cream cheese, and lime zest in a large mixing bowl. Cream butter in. Repeat with egg, milk, and lime juice, one at a time. Make sure your ingredients are thoroughly mixed.

Add dry ingredients slowly. Mix well.

Roll dough into approximately 1” balls. Roll each ball into powdered sugar and place on parchment paper-lined cookie sheet.

Bake for approximately 11-12 minutes until lightly golden.

Before you eat, close your eyes and imagine yourself beneath swaying palm trees with warm sand between your toes. Merry Christmas!

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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:

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

About the Book

Isn’t That Idea a Bit Crazy and Farfetched?

About the Book

About the Book

3 Things That Make My Christmas Heart Sing

That’s when it happened.

But I promised to tell you three things that make my heart sing at Christmas.

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.

Christmas in “The Christmas City”

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

Video Chat with Chautona:

Thank you!