Book Review of His Mistletoe Family by Ruth Logan Herne

Book Review: His Mistletoe Family (Love Inspired)

Author: Ruth Logan Herne

 

I won this book in a contest and was lucky enough to receive an autographed copy. Thank you, Ruthy. As with your other books, I truly enjoyed this story.

I must admit the length of this books surprised me. Slightly longer than a novella, it left me wishing for more. It’s a sweet story about a woman that becomes guardian of her two orphaned nephews and has no idea how to be a parent. She meets Brett Stanton, a significantly older man, when she takes the boys to a free Thanksgiving dinner at a church. Brett is a former soldier doing his best to forget what his influence did to his only son and his younger brother. When Haley Jennings walks into his life he finds himself wanting to live again instead of hide from life as he has been. The age difference between this couple was written in such a way that I found myself forgetting about it until those moments when it cropped up in the story. Times like when Brett tells Haley he was in the army for twenty five years…and I remember that she’s twenty eight. This was a good, clean book that kept me entertained to the end.

Book Rating: Good

Young Reader Rating: 13 and up

There were no adult scenes in this book. The few kisses were short and sweet and mostly blended into the moment so that only a couple seemed to hold great significance. The hero did father a child out of wedlock and was an absentee dad. And the heroine spends more time at work than with her new family. Although neither of these situations is a problem or treated in any way that comes across as such, I can see where it could influence younger readers.

Book Review of Meant To Be Mine by Becky Wade

Book Review: Meant to Be Mine

Author: Becky Wade

 

This book starts out five years in the past. Celia Park has been in love with Ty Porter since she was fourteen. A reunion with him in Las Vegas lands her in a wedding chapel in the middle of the night, after a whirlwind four day relationship. The next morning Ty informs her he made a mistake; that he was drunk and he’s in love with, and planning to marry, someone else.

Five years later, Celia hasn’t seen or heard from Ty since she walked out of that Vegas hotel room, her heart broken, her dreams shattered. She’s given up her plans for her life to make a secure home for her daughter. When Ty reappears in her life, he gets more than he bargained for when he meets the little girl that has his name and discovers she’s his daughter. Still married, he faces Celia’s anger and hate while he tries to get to know his daughter. The couple struggle through this new situation they find themselves in while dealing with the pull that’s still between them. This book made my keep-it list and has had me rereading favorite scenes.

Rating: Loved it

Young Reader Rating: Very Adult

Adult scenes crop up in this book at the very beginning of chapter two. From there suggestions, comments, and situations keep coming. While the hero and heroine are married, divorce is mentioned multiple times in the book. The hero ends his relationship, and therefore his marriage, with Celia because he wants to be married to someone else. When they meet back up he tells Celia he’s planning to “make my move” on another woman, despite the fact that they’re still married. In another scene, he tells the other woman he’s going to put a ring on her finger and minutes after she leaves his house, he’s on the phone with Celia making suggestive statements to her. In another scene he asks two women (three, if you count his sister-in-law) to run away with him while his wife is in the next room. The hero borders on an addiction to pain pills, admits he was drunk in the first scene, and goes to a bar and gets drunk in another.

Bookaholic Support Group

Books.

Five letters, one word. Basic, simple, easy. Some words have multiple meaning with only one spelling, others have one meaning but several spellings that get us into that area of having to know how many o’s to put behind a t or whether or not to add an e to the end, an i-e, or a y.

But not books. That word is simple and easy to understand. No one questions it. But it’s…um…a code word.

Yes, you read that right. It’s a code word. Those five little letters hide worlds we can only imagine, they hide our best friends, our worst enemies. They stand for the stacks and stacks of books I own, the ones I want to own, and the ones I will own.

That code word opens worlds I never thought possible, not just on the printed pages but in my real life. I discuss authors with strangers at my favorite book store. I trade emails with writers I never thought I’d know. I’ve written manuscripts, entered contests, and tried new things because of books.

Books. Code word for addiction. If you’re a bookaholic, you understand, if you’re not…I’m sorry.

For those of us that suffer from the affliction, there is no cure. Only…more books.

Hello, my name is Crystal. I am addicted to books. I love the feel of them in my hand, the sound of the pages when I flip through them, the way they look all stacked up and waiting for my attention. I am not trying to recover from my addiction. I do not want to give up my temptation. I am me, and they are books, and we are happy together.

Would anyone care to join my support group?

Book Reveiw of Loving the Lawman by Ruth Logan Herne

Book Review: Loving the Lawman (Love Inspired)

Author: Ruth Logan Hearne

 

I won this book in a contest and held off on reading it for a while. I found myself surprised at the length of this book. For someone that generally reads historical books in the 80,000-100,000 word range, this book was small and had me zipping through it in a day. But the story was good, covered a subject lot of women face today, but many consider controversial. Pregnant widow, Gianna Costanza, moves to a small town in New York, looking for a new start. And a place to raise her babies. Deputy Sheriff Seth Campbell’s new tenant catches his attention from the moment she walks through his door. Trouble is, she has less than no interest in another lawman and she doesn’t seem concerned with the fact that she’s depriving the father of her children the right to be a part of their lives. Circumstances and unwanted attraction keep throwing this pair together. Despite their best intentions they find themselves drawn to each other. This is a quick moving, sweet story that hit me in a way most don’t.

Rating: Loved it

Young Reader Rating: 13 and up

This book has some areas that could be seen as inappropriate for younger readers. The heroine is expecting twins conceived using the help of modern medical technology. She is a single mother that made the choice to have a baby after her husband died. The hero is divorced, his former wife is a drug addict that abandons her child on his doorstep. The young girl has had a hard life and there are hints that she may have been through traumas at the hands of her mother’s boyfriends.

Invaders

I was sitting at my computer, working on my latest manuscript when I looked across the room and…

There.

He.

Was.

Warming himself next to my Himalayan salt lamp, making himself comfortable. Big and ugly. Hideous, actually. The stuff nightmares are made of. The kind of thing that makes me want to run screaming out of the house, down the street and anywhere he wasn’t at. In my manuscripts I can let my heroines do that, but in my real life…not an option.

So I sucked in a deep breath, tried to stop the heebie-jeebies that had a firm hold on me, forced my hands steady and dropped an empty glass jar over the ugly monster trying to make my kitchen his home.

We had a short battle. He was determined not to be captured and I am firmly convinced the only good scorpion is a dead one. You’ll never convince me otherwise. And this one wanted to live in my house. So not happening.

I won the battle and got the thing trapped under glass. Only then…how to get him from under the jar to in it. Perseverance. Finally I succeeded and added a lid to this beast's new and final home. War over. Ugly invader facing his just reward for trying to share my home and interrupting my word count.

Yes, I’m certain this creature was a male. It was too ugly to be female. Don’t bother telling me that in the animal kingdom males are often prettier than females. I’m not buying it. This ugly thing was male. Definitely.

I think he is destined to become an outlaw in one of my books. Maybe he’ll show up as the scorpion he is or maybe he’ll show up as a beady eyed man with scrawny arms and a rounded middle determined to kill the heroine, and his name? Scorpion of course.