Congratulations Lynn Austin

For the 8th (8th!!!) time, Lynn Austin won the Christy Award for Best Historical novel.  Far and away she has won more Christys than any other author and deservedly so: she is the best in the business.

Read my review of the award-winning Wonderland Creek


Read the full list of Christy Award winnners here 

The Messenger by Siri Mitchell

Siri Mitchell’s work is often featured here because I think (nay… I KNOW) she is one of the strongest historical voices in the CBA.  One such reason for commending her is her wide range. Unlike many authors of her ilk, she stretches boundaries by playing with narrative voice and writing well-researched books about a variety of time periods.  She is clever, intelligent, writes inspiring heroines dealt interesting hands in a myriad of historical eras and fills her prose with acute verisimilitude which reads in a flawless, effortless manner.

Here, Mitchell’s canvas is the conflicts embedded in the Revolutionary War.  Philadelphia: from its higher society to its low tavern world is peppered with spy rings, mystery, heart-pulsing tension, and cloaked faith even while humanity pits against each other.  The Messenger is divided between the voices and perspectives of young Quaker woman Hannah Sunderland and Colonial spy Jeremiah Jones. Hannah, desperate to aid her rebel twin brother during imprisonment is forced to live outside of her usually rigid and conservative realm.  Jeremiah, knows he needs the guise of Hannah’s innocence to help permeate the prison walls; but is initially unsure if this strict young woman is up to task.  Both Hannah and Jeremiah will have to test their own wills, trust in each other and step outside of their comfort zones to achieve their mutual purpose.

There is a love story in the novel; but it takes back-burner to the well-wrought tension at the forefront. Indeed, Mitchell  does well at plotting and propelling action forward simultaneously developing her characters and their growing attachment in stride.  There is a palpable sense of dramatic irony felt from the first few pages for the anticipating reader; but Hannah and Jeremiah remain realistic unsure of their growing dependence on each other.  Thus, their relationship is meted out slowly and in a believable manner.

I read somewhere ( perhaps on the thread Siri Mitchell contributed to on the Bethany House facebook page) that Revolutionary History was is not deemed overly popular in the CBA: I, however, was fascinated by this unique setting and immediately want more.  It made me want to revisit the beautiful HBO John Adams film and re-read more about our American neighbours and their hard-fought forge toward independence.  I  appreciated Mitchell’s inherent grasp of Quaker traditions: including the “thees” and “thous” implanted in dialect.  This put me in mind of Alice Henderson in Catherine Marshall’s Christy and allowed me to readily establish a narrative constant in my head when reading Hannah’s version of the story.

I also very much enjoyed the unbreakable bond between Hannah and her twin brother. I had often heard that twins can experience the misfortune of one another and that indelible invisible thread that forces Hannah to risk all to save her beloved brother was quite moving.

There is an adamant and abundant theme of grace and trusting; yet, none of the characters are “sickeningly” Christian.  In fact, Mitchell excels at penning heroes and heroines tested by faith and plagued by the doubts that withstand any time period.  None of her heroines are perfect; yet all strive to live up to the metrics of their conscience: which is all that one can ask given the frustratingly blurred line between dark and light so apparent during this time in history.

A few Siri Mitchell review from the backlogs:

Chateau of Echoes

A Heart Most Worthy

Visit Siri Mitchell on the web

I received this review copy from Graf Martin Communications on behalf of Baker Publishing Group.

Sixty Acres and a Bride by Regina Jennings

There’s nothing quite like a re-imagining of the Book of the Ruth; which readers of this blog know is my favourite Bible story. These past few years, we were doled out a remarkable reconstruction of the tale with Liz Curtis Higgs’ Here Burns My Candle and Mine is the Night, which, you’ll remember, I absolutely loved.

In Sixty Acres and a Bride we move to 19th Century Texas: the heart of the romanticized West. Here, the young Mexican widow, Rosa Garner and her mother-in-law are forced to return to the family ranch after falling on hard times. Rosa is like a flood of colour and light, breaking the American traditions with her spicy personality and exotic looks. Like the ostracized Ruth in the Bible story, Rosa is immediately an outsider and speculation as to this girl straight from mountains of Mexico leads to conflict. Rosa tries to grow accustomed to the American way; but her flavour and flair cannot help but stick out. While her exotic beauty tantalizes some; it repels others and it is in the hands of the decent Weston Garner that her fate will be changed.

Weston Garner is our Boaz of the Biblical re-telling. He is nursing his own broken heart, is steadfast and strong, is shrouded in mystery and genuine goodwill. It takes quite a lot for these two to jump through the hurdles to secure their respective happiness; but when they do, the reader is well-rewarded. Weston’s view of love as sacred and true is well-developed and happily meted out when he finally does come to an agreement with our heroine. Like the best love stories, it is not the surprise of love, rather its fulfillment and that is what makes the Book of Ruth the fairytale of the Bible (God loves a Cinderella ending as much as we do) as it does this book an inventive way of discovering a well-known tale in a different setting.


I don’t always speak to literary and descriptive devices when I write a book review; but I was taken by some of Jennings’ innovate infusion of consonance and imagery in her debut novel. A few sentences of note: “By the time the bats were swooping in the twilight…” was one such instance and “the treetops where swinging around like the tip of a whip.” I really liked the unexpected placement of these creative and colourful lines in a straight forward historical romance.

The American West has long acted as a favourite canvas for Christian historical series and I appreciate Jennings using her obvious passion for its gritty and lovely dissonance to paint the well-known story here.

Visit Regina's blog where she discusses her journey to publication, includes photos of launch events and even lets us know what she's reading (it's an eclectic mix)

Her website is here

Buy the book on amazon
 
Ruth is not only four chapters long (short), it's my favourite Book of the Bible. You can read it herehttp://www.readbibleonline.net/?page_id=15

note: this book has been provided for my review courtesy of Baker Publishing Group and Graf-Martin Communications, Inc.  It is available at your favourite bookseller from Bethany House, a division of Baker Publishing Group.

Blogher Book Buzz: Wonderland Creek

I was so excited to hear from BlogHer last week informing me that my blog had been chosen as the book spotlight today. Even more exciting, they are featuring my review of Wonderland Creek by Lynn Austin.

You ALL know how much I love Lynn Austin and I hope the love translates as more people pick up her amazing books!

Check out BlogHer: a repository for a blog under every subject you could ever dream of and experience their "life well said"

A Lasting Impression by Tamera Alexander

Claire Laurent's greatest desire is to create a unique and lasting masterpiece; not continually copy and forge the masterpieces of the famous artists her father will in turn peddle at their New Orleans gallery. When her father dies, and Claire is left without provision and highly suspicious that her past will follow her, she craves the anonymity she finds at the historic Belmont Mansion in Nashville. Here, under the employment of the regal and eccentric Adelicia Acklen, Claire is able to break free from her past and start establishing a life of her own.  When Sutton Munroe, an attractive attorney, crosses her path, Claire is certain that he knows more than he lets on and that their growing attraction may indeed lead her straight into the excavation of her scandalous past.


The War Between the States lingers as an inflicting and haunting memory as the stage is set for intrigue, romance, forgery, theft and redemption.

I must admit that I was growing tired of Alexander's usual canvas of frontier America and small Colorado towns.  Luckily, Alexander has steered in a completely different direction in A Lasting Impression and inserts her not inconsiderable knowledge of Belmont, Adelicia Acklen and the world of 19th Cenury art into a charming story of life in the new Antebellum. I enjoyed the unique setting and Alexander's attention to historic detail.  Moreover, I enjoyed how colourfully the world was painted: from Claire's early days in New Orleans ( a city whose geography I know quite well due to a stay in the Summer) through to her numerous encounters with the charming Sutton Munroe. Described as akin to The David in the text, I immediately painted him as actor Matt Bomer (see if you don't enjoy this mental caption, ladies, as you wander through this novel!)

As per a previous novel, I was disappointed that Alexander again attempted to infuse a French culture, dialect and a few threaded exclamations to match her heroine's background.  Alexander failed notably with this before and having not yet conquered this flow, her dialect and dialogue were distracting.

I also found the book to be rather lengthy for the time it would have needed to cover the romance and the plot.  Not many Christian romance novels sit at the length of Alexander's latest book and this is one case where a bit of editing would have made for a much tighter and more enjoyable read.

Nonetheless, I think this is a strong novel from an author whose previous books have always shown potential. It is quite obvious that Tamera Alexander's inspiring visits to Belmont wrought great creative insight and she excels at taking a historical character and flashing her in dimensional life as a support to the main action of the novel.

My sincere thanks to Bethany House for the review copy!

Please visit Tamera Alexander's website and blog

Learn more about Belmont and Adelicia Acklen

Purchase A Lasting Impression at amazon

A Most Unsuitable Match by Stephanie Grace Whitson

I must confess that when I first started this novel, I hadn't a lot of high hopes.  The plot involving a newly orphaned heiress boarding a steamship to Montana where she hopes to embark on a search for a long lost aunt seemed tantamount to usual Christian romance fare.  I knew that, while onboard, she would meet up with a dashing gent completely out of her class and that this, alone, would most likely propel the story to a typical romantic climax.



I was completely wrong. Every twist and turn in this surprisingly mysterious and enigmatic tale of life in a small Montana town bereft of the gold-mining fortune once predicted was compellingly readable. From the moment the first steamship catches fire and our heroine, Fannie Rousseau, is forced to alter her course, I knew that I had stumbled upon a deceptively simple book with a wealth of goodness inside.  Not just goodness in the traditional Biblical message it inferences ( especially through the boat hand, Lamar Davis and Samuel Beck, a would-be parson en route to find his sister); but goodness in its unraveling of a thoroughly unexpected yarn.  Indeed, the action really picks up when the story takes a complete curve: leaving all anticipation of a regular, hum-drum, steamboat adventure novel in the dust.

I was most captivated by Miss Rousseau's time and developing friendships in the crudely primitive rivertown, Fort Benton. The narrative involving Fannie's steamship carriage is well-knit: especially when Whitson threads it with the obvious research she did before setting to write of life on the river. The motif of Great Expectations, a book mentioned numerous times on the novel seems an apt reflection of Fannie's change of circumstance: from upward nobility to orphan on the brink of familiar ruin.  Fannie's desperation to understand her deceased mother and to hopefully forge a new relationship with her lost aunt is touching. It parallels Samuel Beck's own search for his sister: abused and injured at the hands of their abusive father.

The themes of makeshift family and of circumstances changed to humble Fannie's upbringing are endearing to read. Solid characterization helps paint Whitson's novel in three-dimensional light.  While Whitson does hold back on the italicized prayers (thank heavens), she does infuse her story with a solid Gospel offering in the old fashion "sinners repent"/come ye hither way. It is a delight not to find the Biblical themes convoluted or deeply and subtly ingrained: rather blatantly flashed as they propel the story forward.  When Fannie finally learns how her prejudice has led to misgivings on true character, she is able to view her new life in Fort Benton in a new light.  Moreover, as Samuel Beck leans more on the simplest of Biblical messages with a jubilance that loans itself to his boy-like wonder ( learning Jesus is coming back, setting up a makeshift service in a brothel wherein the sweetest of scripture and a few well-known hymns move his unlikely congregation, the aid of a freighter willing to help on a journey due to Samuel's being able to recite the Shepherd's Psalm he used to know) and packs a punch as it unfurls the deeper spiritual context of the story.

I was really impressed with this book; mostly because it's cover and backplot are as ironically deceptive as some of the outward appearances of Fannie's numerous and colourful encounters.

As for the romance plot, it is not as easily threaded as expected as not one, but two worthy suitors flood the pages and the reader is unsure which would be best suited to our newly intrepid heroine.

I highly recommend this book and I thank Whitson for unintentionally calling me out by the strong words within her covers.  I honestly thought I was settling in to a  by-the-numbers Christian romance wherein I solidly believed I could unravel the outcome. I was thoroughly wrong as her novel aptly took some surprising turns, is influenced with a well-plotted Gospel theme or two and is old-fashioned in its testimonial spunk. For those who love Love, there is a sweet theme wherein Fannie and her friend Minette describe finding love as an answering echo.

My thanks to Bethany House for the review copy.
Visit Stephanie Grace Whitson on the web
Buy A Most Unsuitable Match on amazon

The Maid of Fairbourne Hall by Julie Klassen

Like The Silent Governess and The Girl in the Gatehouse, I found little believability in the plot of The Maid of Fairbourne Hall: so quickly is it doled out and with so many happenstances and ironic circumstances. I was quite impressed with Klassen's The Apothecary's Daughter and The Lady of Milkweed Manor as she ushered out information little known of the Regency period, esoteric as it was in her weaving of it into the Austen-esque storylines.

While the setting and historical canvas of Klassen's work involves similarities to Austen, her modern writing and dialogue fail to emulate the great writer she is so trying to mirror. Nonetheless, I found this to be the strongest work of her past three and I read it in nearly one sitting so cozy was the story and so light and airy as to meet my requirements for perfect holiday reading.

Margaret Macy stands to inherit a large fortune come her twenty-fifth birthday.  Her lecherous step-father and his ill-reputed nephew plot that they should place her in a compromising position; thus securing her need to marry into the family so they can whittle at her fortune as they may.  Comparing her plight to that of the Biblical Joseph and Potiphar's wife, Margaret flees with her lady's maid and finds herself employed in Maidstone, Kent at Fairbourne Hall.  Ironically, this is the country estate belonging to the brothers Upchurch: both previous suitors when Margaret was a belle of the ton. Nathaniel Upchurch had even proposed marriage;but the young and impressionable Margaret failed to realize the potential of the grown man who had developed so positively while under the employ of his father in Barbados. The other Upchurch brother, Lewis, is a dashing rake whose flirtations with various "chits" is as upending as his disregard for his family's hard-earned fortune.

Nathaniel has returned to oversee that the investments and income made by the family are done so in an appropriate and prudent manor: especially as he has begun disdaining his father's continued use of slaves in the Colonial world.  Nathaniel's sister, Helen, is also in residence at Fairbourne, mourning the loss of her fiance to the sea and relegated to a life of spinsterhood. Margaret, now an undermaid called Nora Garrret, is able to witness first hand the glimpses of family life afforded those below stairs.  As she struggles to keep her identity hidden and to waylay her growing attraction to Nathaniel, the man she had scorned earlier, she learns valuable lessons about the true virtue of character, of hard work and of the selflessness reliance on and working for others affords.

This was a big year for upstairs/downstairs stories: the wildly popular ITV production of Downton Abbey and the revamp of Upstairs Downstairs delighted the hearts of many period-loving viewers. Klassen has done well at recreating this world in the Regency period. Her historical knowledge is not limited and she does well at providing a realistic glimpse into servant life. Indeed, this is when her writing is strongest: as Margaret/Nora learns about the hard work involved in the running of the household and the hierarchy and politics at play in the downstairs world.  As mentioned, it is not her historical knowledge that falters; rather her writing style, her penchant for superfluous chapter endings and portentous foreshadowing detracts from the Austen-like feel of her world. Moreover, she fails to create believable dialect for an Irish maid and for Margaret/Nora's assumed accent (more blatant having read plausible dialect of the same sort in The Colonel's Lady early this week).

Having recently finished two outstanding Christian novels (Wonderland Creek and The Colonel's Lady) and applauding the spark of originality in each: the individual author's propensity to leak their passion and personality into well-written prose, I was slightly deflated upon finishing this story. It is a competent story and certainly readable enough to keep you turning; but, like Klassen's recent work, lacks a definitive spark.

I kept thinking while ploughing through, that while I would gladly revisit the two aforementioned novels, this will be donated to a church library in the near future. I think Klassen does have a passion for the period: it is evident in her painstaking research; unfortunately, she is still unable to capture the easy wonder of her debut novel.  She is remarkably gifted and with careful honing and some more good editing from our friends at Bethany House, she may just bring something as exceptional as my two previous reads in the future.


Sidenote: this book has one of the worst Bethany covers I have seen in an age.

You can buy the book at amazon
Visit Julie Klassen's website