stories
Hope Reborn – Caryl McAdoo
Another fantastic story by Caryl; if you have not had a chance to read some of her novels yet, you have got to pick one up and read it, as soon as possible.
Yes, like right now. You should get on your Amazon account, search her name, and just pick a book. Any book will do. They are all great, and it is a perfect day to start a new story.
Okay, back to the story…Hope Reborn is a historical romance novel, set in Texas in the 1850’s. It centers around Millicent May Meriwether, but do not call her Millicent. She writes romance novels, and decides to make her way to Texas both to research for future novels, as well as help a family friend.
Receiving a warm welcome into Texas, May and her personal assistance and Man-of-All-Things-Needed, Chester, end up taking temporary residence at the estate of Henry Buckmeyer. A widower with a brood of children, and a staff to help run his estate, May is afraid she may have indeed found what she has been looking for; a man to spend the rest of her life with. Afraid because she has lost and suffered so much already.
May and Henry both seem to have secrets to hide, and May needs to decide if she can give her whole self to this man who lost so much when he lost his wife. A man of Faith might just be the undoing of May and her hopes and dreams. She never could understand why anyone would believe in fairytales like God and Jesus.
As storylines intertwine, May and Henry are not the only ones who find answers to questions long asked. More than one situation finds the resolution needed and desired.
As I try to never give away spoilers, this is one book you will need to read for yourself. It is well-written, clean, and has you hoping and cheering for everyone involved.
You can get this story free on Amazon for the next 5 days! Do not miss out on this great opportunity here: http://www.amazon.com/Hope-Reborn-Texas-Romance-Book-ebook/dp/B00RASZWEY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1421018283&sr=8-1&keywords=Hope+Reborn+Caryl+McAdoo
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Don’t Miss Out On This Free Book by Caryl McAdoo!
Another fantastic story by Caryl McAdoo, Hope Reborn is a Texas Romance set in the mid 1850’s. I read this story and really enjoyed it, and if you like historical novels, romance novels (clean romance novels!), or just a story that will make you feel good, you should give this one a try!
You can’t beat free, and once you get a taste of one of Caryl’s stories, you will be wanting more! Stop by tomorrow for my review of this book!
Get your copy from Amazon here: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Hope+Reborn+Caryl+McAdoo and be sure to let me know how you enjoyed the story!
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Capital Offence – Robert S. Scott
Have you ever done something when you were young that you regret?
Well, of course you have; we all have.
Do you hate politics? Do you love politics? Are you sure the government of wherever you may live is out to get the “little man?” Yeah; most of us are.
But what do you do when you are involved in something horrible as a young teenager, yet you become the Prime Minister of your country?
Yep. You hide it all. You build a new life; you ignore those who stood by you.
Flesh and blood? No Matter. You have to do what you have to do to protect yourself, your family, and your image.
But when you are the Prime Minister, and your brother is going to face the death penalty in 30 days; then what do you do?
This is a fast-paced, long read. But it is worth every second of it. The story moves quickly, and you will not want to put it down. This was another story where I kept telling myself, “just one more chapter”. That one more chapter usually became 3 more chapters.
For this story, I am standing by my “no-spoilers” clause. But this story definitely deserves your attention. You want to read it. And once you start, you will not want to put it down.
Trust me, I know. I wake up at 2 am like clockwork, and I was grabbing this story to continue reading.
You definitely want to get to know this author. You can do so here: https://robertsscott.wordpress.com/tag/political-thriller-capital-offence/
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Repurposed Books, Into Art!
The last thing I would ever do is willingly destroy a book. But to take a book that has lived its life and turn it into art? Amazing!
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Bashed – Barbara Marquardt – I Managed Almost 4 Chapters…
…and then I could not take another word of it. I wanted to like it, and I tried to like it. But I just could not read any more of it.
(ATTENTION! If anyone decides to get this book, for free I hope, and skim through it, I would love to hear what your take was on the story. If 5 people can tell me I was wrong, I will remove this review, and send an apology to the author. Any takers?)
First, the premise of the story. A teacher at a high school, seemingly for the town’s cast-off kids whose parents stopped caring, gets locked into a storage room over Christmas break by an 18 year old who she has continuously had issues with because she tried to make him learn, but had no choice other than to fail him.
I did not read too far beyond this point, at least not far enough to get to the chapter where she is rescued. The story continues with a battle between her and this student, the usual he-said-she-said things. Per the synopsis, the public and school officials are quick to blame her after her rescue, because he is the star football player. The synopsis continues that this event changed her life in many ways, but as I am not going to continue reading this story, I cannot tell you what those changes are.
I stopped reading the story when Jean, the main character, was locked in the storage room. The storage room with a window. With a plexi-glass window. Already with a hole in it and spider-webbed cracks. I went back and literally read everything over again, trying to see if it mentioned some reason, somewhere, as to why she would not have broken the window and got out. Was it too small? Too high up? Why would you be looking out a window, at your freedom, and not try to get out?
I skimmed further along, because I really had to know if this glaring issue got resolved. I got to about the half-way point in the story, and the author mentioned that the room was on the 3rd floor. Thanks for letting me know.
Another issue, right from the start, was the lack of a cell phone.
Why was her purse and all of her belongings in the storage room, yet she has no cell phone. No cell phone. This book was published in 2009, and it is not set in the 1960’s. Why would she not have a cell phone?
I know; because if she had a cell phone, the author could not have written this story. What the author should have done, is explain why there was no cell phone, instead of just ignoring that flashing-neon error like no one would ever think twice about someone not having a cell phone.
The writing was also not very good, as far as sentence structure and the use of the English language in general. So even if I could of ignored the 2 huge errors that were distracting me, I could not read through the choppy use of the English language. Am I being harsh? Possibly. I will blame it on 2 wonderful weeks of vacation, and my first Monday back to work. Yeah; that’s it.
This story had one review on Goodreads, at 4 stars. It had 2 excellent reviews on Amazon, both from school teachers. The free ebook site I got it from had 5 reviews, all 5 stars. But no actual written review. Just stars. You can buy it on Amazon for $9.00, or get it free from here: http://www.free-ebooks.net/ebook/Bashed
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It’s Getting Cold In Michigan~With a Storm On the Way…
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Murder Is Binding – Lorna Barrett
The first book in another series by Lorna Barrett, these books are sold under the “A Booktown Mystery” tag line. Set in Stoneham, New Hampshire, Tricia Miles is one of many bookstore owners who finds herself caught in the center of this small town’s first murder in decades.
Stoneham is a sleepy town on the coast, where in order to boost the tourism and economy, Bob Kelly, president of the Chamber of Commerce, had the idea to rebuild the center of the town and have various bookstores that cater to the tourism from neighboring cities and states.
Tricia Miles owns “Haven’t Got a Clue”, a bookstore devoted to mystery novels. There is also “The Cookery”, devoted to cookbooks, and “History Repeats Itself”, specializing in historical novels. Who wouldn’t want to live in a town with so many great little bookstores? Well, except for the murders, that is.
Apparently Bob Kelly is putting the pressure on one of the bookstore owners, threatening to raise her lease amount when it is time to renew. Tricia wants nothing more than to run her store, and not get involved in all of the issues going on around her. When her sister, Angelica, decides to come for a visit, Tricia knows her peace and quiet is officially over. Questioning what the ulterior motive is for the visit from Ange, Tricia’s days of calm and quiet are about to end.
As is my policy, about 98% of the time, there will be no spoilers here. What I can tell you though, is that this story is a fun read, full of twists and turns, and it will keep you guessing until the end. It also includes recipes that are mentioned throughout the story, and the antics of the shop cat, Miss Marple, will have you smiling!
If you love books as much as I do, you certainly will not want to pass up the opportunity to read a story about books, bookstores, murder, and mayhem! I do have 7 of the 8 books in this series, so you will be hearing more about this fun series in the near future.
You can visit her website here: http://lornabarrett.com/
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I Wrote How Many Book Reviews?
I thought I should do a final post for 2014 of how many books I actually read, how many of those resulted in book reviews I posted, and anything else I may have thrown in.
I could really tell from my blog activity what months were the most busy for me. Or should I say, what months I was working on the toughest MBA college classes.
I did a whole lot of nothing in the summer months when it came to posting book reviews. I was really busy from September to December, and although I have every good intention of reading at least 3 more books when I finish the one I am currently on, I thought this would be a good time to do this post.
As a side note, I am off work until January 5th, and am kid free until January 4th. Which means I have a whole lot of reading-in-bed-writing-reviews-playing-with-the-cat-nap-time planned 🙂
For the year as a whole, I posted to date, 67 book reviews.
Of those 67 reviews, 18 were of books I had previously read, so for 2014 I read 49 new books. Not too shabby for being a single Mom of a whole lot of girls, working 50+ hours a week, and going to college for my MBA. The 18 on books I previously read were a combination of Halloween features, Christmas features, and books that I had read in the past that had a great impact on me.
June was the only month I did not post any book reviews, and October was my busiest month, with 12 book reviews posted. I have to add that for December I am currently at 7, and do plan on at least 5 more before the New Year, but certainly do not expect it to exceed October.
Some notables for 2014 for me:
I made the very tough decision to begin working on my MBA. After working non-stop for 2 years straight to get my BBA, I did take the entire year of 2013 off, as I promised my girls, and did not start college again until January 4th, 2014.
After many months of contemplating, searching, and debating, I became the very proud owner of Beeblebrox Bare Bottom Benjamin Blu, or Benny to me! He is a Hairless Sphynx cat and I am not ashamed to say that little ball of wrinkled-velvety-soft skin has changed my life! I like to tease my 4 girls about their “little brother’, but believe you me, that little guy has gotten me through a lot of weekends when I was wide awake all night long from being a 3rd shift worker and having the weekend off.
I made the decision to leave my Supervision position with my company and go back to a Materials Coordinator position that I had previously worked in for almost 5 years. I have worked for my company for over 18 years, and am so thankful to have such a wonderful employer.
I joined the Editorial Freelancers Association, and am currently working on getting myself set to begin editing and proofreading books for new and current authors. I have a love for books and the English language that I would probably have a very difficult time putting into words in order to get anyone to understand. (Now that is ironic, right?)
I would personally like to thank each and every single one of you for liking, following, or just commenting on a random blog post. I could not begin to tell you the excitement I have when I see that someone liked a post I made, and even better yet, left a comment, or followed my blog!
I will be setting some goals for myself for 2015, and there will be more to come on that!
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An Author Will Change Your Life!
booksandopinions.com 