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 reading suggestions, I’ve cultivated a page just for that. (Note that it is still being updated throughout the year, so feel free to message me with suggestions.) I recommend you also checking Inspirational Historical Fiction Index or the Facebook Group Avid Readers of Christian Fiction or my Facebook group Crystal Caudill’s Reading Friends. 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.
July Verse: A time to embrace and a time to turn away.
Challenge Theme: Second Chance Romance or Family/Friend Reconciliation
August Verse: A time to search and a time to quit searching.
Challenge Theme: A mystery or a theme of someone searching for family
A Gilded Age Getaway
by Stephenia H. McGee
Review by: Crystal Caudill
I’ve been enjoying Stephenia’s Back Inn Time series in between longer books. I especially adored this one because it wasn’t just a romance. It was a second-chance romance between a married couple who didn’t quite realize how much their marriage needed saving. Fiona is a mom of young ones who often feels like she’s going it alone. Tyler is a loving husband and dad who struggles to be present for his family has he manages his family’s company and tries to support his wife and kids in the way they deserve. I think every family probably walks through this season of marriage, and it was such a breath of fresh air to not only enjoy and benefit from Stephenia’s wise growth of the characters but get to do it set against the backdrop of the most extravagant ball ever thrown. Equal parts exciting and impactful, this is a story I recommend for those unmarried as well as those married. It’s a realistic look at the hardships of marriage with children and the necessary fight for each other. It’s so easy for the exhaustion of parenting and providing to chip away at our relationships, and this just brought an often quiet topic to the forefront. I adore Stephenia for doing this on a regular basis.
Genre: Time Travel – Gilded Age
Plot Overview:
Can one magical night of glamour in the past save their future?
When Fiona Robinson imagined her life with Tyler, she dreamed of a grand adventure. Together. But after a decade of marriage, suburban seclusion, and stress from his job, she’s let the strain of being a stay-at-home mom of two toddlers squeeze all the fun out of their relationship.
With pressure mounting at work and his homelife growing stale, Tyler’s fighting to recapture the joy in his marriage. But he can’t seem to do anything right, his job’s drained his energy, and his wife no longer resembles the fun-loving girl he married.
Then Fiona’s mother presents them with an anniversary weekend getaway at a seaside B&B, and they hope it can rekindle their romance. But they never could have imagined their room would transport them to the Gilded Age in New York! Now, can one night at the famed Vanderbilt ball reignite their spark, or will they be stuck in a future neither of them expected?
Purchase Links:
Stephenia’s Store | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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.
Recommendations for August:
- The Peasant King by Tessa Afshar
- The Lady & the Highwayman by Sarah M Eden
- Rock Harbor series by Colleen Coble
- Mark of the King by Jocelyn Green
- Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate
- Trapped by Irene Hannon
- The Land Beneath Us by Sarah Sundin
- Blue Moon Promise by Colleen Coble
- A Lady’s Guide to Marvels and Misadventure by Angela Bell
I read The Summer of Yes by Courtney Walsh. I loved it!
I read Love Rekindled by Katie Mettner. I always enjoy books by this author. The storyline never disappoints and all her books have a main character with a disability.
I read “To the Farthest Shores” by Elizabeth Camden. It was a second chance romance with some mystery added to it. I’d recommend! 🙂
I read Into the Starlight by Amanda Cabot. It is the third book in the Secrets of Sweetwater Crossing series and it as great as the first two! It is a second chance at love after death + some fun mystery and suspense! It is a sweet story.
I read The Metropolitan Affair by Jocelyn Green. I enjoyed it, it was fun having a book set in the 1920s during the Egyptian craze.
I read Shadow of Truth by Susan Sleeman. It was an interesting book.
I read A Life Once Dreamed by Rachel Fordham. Overall I enjoyed the book 🙂
I read All My Secrets by Lynn Austin. It’s not exactly a family reconciliation, but I think it’s pretty close (spoiler free). And I also read Collateral Damage by Lynnette Eason, it came very close to being a family reconciliation as well.
Both books are 10/10!
I read The Secrets Beneath by Kimberly Woodhouse and I loved it! I can’t wait to read the rest of the series.
I read three books that work for this challenge:
When Secrets Come Calling by Felicia Ferguson, Hidden in the Night by Elizabeth Goddard, What We Hide by Colleen Coble and Rick Acker
I loved all three of them.
For 2nd chance romance, I read Garden Girls by Jessica Patch.
I read Courage in the Shadows by Robin Patchen. Her Coventry series is excellent!
I read To Charm a Lady by Joanna Barker. It fits under family/friend reconciliation, and I loved it!