It’s another month our challenge: Unlocking Ecclesiastes 3. I’m so excited to join you again this year with guest reviews from our reading challenge participants. If you want to submit a review for upcoming months, feel free to email me using my contact form. If you are looking for suggestions as to what to read each month, may I recommend joining my Crystal Caudill’s Reading Friends Facebook group, or visiting Avid Readers of Christian Fiction or Inspirational Historical Fiction Index. I’ll also include a short list at the bottom of this post. Don’t forget to comment at the bottom of the post for your chance to win a book off my prize shelf. *The list of prizes available from my prize shelf can be found here.*
Unlocking the Past: Ecclesiastes 3
Just as Ecclesiastes has two opposites in each verse, most months will leave you with two options to choose from.
February Verse: A time to plant and a time to harvest.
Challenge Theme: A book with a Rural Setting OR a Major Move/Life Change
March Verse: A time to kill and a time to heal.
Challenge Theme: A book with a serial killer or a character in the medical profession.
The Captive Heart
by Michelle Griep
Review by: Crystal Caudill, reposted from 2019 What I loved: Historical details are always a favorite of mine, and I really loved how the complexities of frontier life were displayed, especially for the heroine. To change from the pampered life of England to the comparably savage struggle of the frontier was fun to live through. I learned so much, and of course, I loved the romance. The struggle between the two to learn to love and trust each other was a slow simmer. Like a stew cooked to perfection takes hours and hours, Love is not rushed, and I really enjoyed that.
Favorite Character and Why: Samuel definitely won me over. He was a complex character, a puzzle to be figured out. He was both a man you loved and accepted as imperfect. He was real.
Who would like this? Anyone who loves frontier stories, romance, action, and danger. Also, if you love marriages of convenience, this is a fun story that breaks some of the molds.
Genre: Historical Romance, American Frontier, 1770 Plot Overview: The wild American wilderness is no place for an elegant English governess
On the run from a brute of an aristocratic employer, Eleanor Morgan escapes from England to America, the land of the free, for the opportunity to serve an upstanding Charles Town family. But freedom is hard to come by as an indentured servant, and downright impossible when she’s forced to agree to an even harsher contract—marriage to a man she’s never met.
Backwoodsman Samuel Heath doesn’t care what others think of him—but his young daughter’s upbringing matters very much. The life of a trapper in the Carolina backcountry is no life for a small girl, but neither is abandoning his child to another family. He decides it’s time to marry again, but that proves to be an impossible task. Who wants to wed a murderer? Both Samuel and Eleanor are survivors, facing down the threat of war, betrayal, and divided loyalties that could cost them everything, but this time they must face their biggest challenge ever . . .Love.
Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Christianbook.com
Giveaway
For your chance to win a print copy, comment with what book YOU read for this month. Use the Rafflecopter below for extra entries and to mark that you left a comment. Entries end on the 7th of each month at midnight EST, and the winner will be drawn sometime that week and notified by email. The winner will be announced on the Rafflecopter widget. *Open to all residents of the contiguous USA, legally able to enter, and an e-book format or Amazon Gift Card will be awarded to those outside that range who are legally able to enter. a Rafflecopter giveaway
Recommendations for March:
- Kaely Quinn Profiler series by Nancy Mehl
- When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin
- Patrick Bowers Files by Steven James (Warning: Graphic)
- With Every Breath by Elizabeth Camden (doctor, TB, mystery)
- While Love Stirs by Lorna Seilstad (light/sweet romance, doctor)
- White City by Grace Hitchcock
- Wedded to War by Jocelyn Green
- A Memory Between Us by Sarah Sundin
- Wings of the Nightingale series by Sarah Sundin
- The Doctor’s Lady by Jody Hedlund
- Lost in Darkness by Michelle Griep
- Within My Heart by Tamera Alexander
- A Lady in Attendance by Rachel Fordham
- At Loves Command by Karen Witemeyer
I read Sowing Season by Katie Powner. It was amazing and ended up fitting both options for the challenge. I highly recommend all of Katie’s books!
Wonderful! I have her books on my TBR pile!
I’ve been reading a series called “Farm to Table” by Amanda Flower. One the books was called “crime and Cherry Pits”.
Oh that is fun! I love the titling!
I read The Cowboy’s Convenient Marriage by Jesse Gusmann. A really good book! Take 2 broken people, their matchmaking friends, and a Marriage of Convenience to get money and save a ranch. Throw in some great kids. Then, have the Cowboy make the move from Texas to North Dakota in the middle of the winter!!!
Add it all together for a heartwarming love story. Jessie Gussman did it again.
How cute! And BRRRRR. That is quite the difference!
I read Counterfeit Hope by Cryatal Caudill. It was so good! I loved how each of the main characters grew in their faith, and how the ending worked so well for them.
Awww! I love that! Thanks so much! I am so glad that you enjoyed it!
The Irish Matchmaker by Jennifer Deibel
Oh that one is on my TBR!
I read “No Place for a Lady” by Maggie Brendan and “When Valleys Bloom Again” by Pat Jeanne Davis. Both books ended on a happy/positive note, but there were definitely trials before the “happy endings”.
I remember “No Place for a Lady” and I read that over a decade ago I think. Wasn’t the main character’s name Crystal? So glad you enjoyed both books!
That’s funny, I’ve had that book probably just as long but never picked it up to read. I’m hoping to read more of my “older stock” this year, but we’ll see what happens. 😜 Yes, that was her name! I alway wondered what it’s like to read a book with your name in it, would it be weird, cool, or would you even notice.
I read Rocky Mountain Promise by Misty Beller. It was a really interesting book.
I’ve got all of her books on my TBR.
I read Embers in the London Sky by Sarah Sundin. I always enjoy her books and this one was no exception. 😊
Yay! I’ve heard good things about it!
I read Aiming for Love by Mary Connealy. I figured I couldn’t get much more rural than a mountain with three people living on it!
LOL! You got that right!
For February, I read The Irish Matchmaker by Jennifer Deible for a rural setting.
That one is on my TBR!
I read Chasing the Horizon by Mary Connealy which had a rural setting and also a major move and life change. I always enjoy Mary’s books. They’re so creative and fun!
They really are! So glad you enjoyed it!
I read The Love Coward by Naomi Munsch which is set on a farm primarily. Recommended!
For February I read several books.
The Courage to Dream series (Irish Meadows, A Worthy Heart, and Love’s Faithful Promise), by Susan Anne Mason. Partly rural setting, plus major move/ life change. 10/10 recommend (100/10 recommend for Downton Abbey fans).
I also read Under Texas Stars (Blue Moon Promise, and Safe in His Arms), by Colleen Coble. Rural setting, plus major move/ life change. 10/10 recommend!
Blue Moon Promise probably fits the prompt the best. Really, REALLY, rural, MAJOR move, and SO many life changes.
I read quite a few books that fit the February challenge. Reverence in the Wilderness by Andrea Byrd, The Irish Matchmaker by Jennifer Deibel, Assaulted Caramel by Amanda Flower, The Captive Heart by Michelle Griep, and The Reckoning at Gossamer Pond all had a rural setting. Plus Fatal Witness by Patricia Bradley and Embers in the London Sky by Sarah Sundin involved a major life change/move.
I was on the launch team for a few of those and got a couple through NetGalley. I loved them all.