"Come Back to Me" by Jody Hedlund - Waters of Time, book 1

The ultimate cure that could heal any disease? Crazy. That's exactly what research scientist Marian Creighton has always believed about her father's quest, even if it does stem from a desire to save her sister Ellen from the genetic disease that stole their mother from them. But when her father falls into a coma after drinking a vial of holy water believed to contain traces of residue from the Tree of Life, Marian must question all of her assumptions. He's left behind tantalizing clues that suggest he's crossed back in time. Insane. Until Marian tests his theories and finds herself in the Middle Ages during a dangerous peasant uprising. William Durham, a valiant knight comes to Marian's rescue and offers her protection . . . as his wife. The longer Marian stays in the past, the more she cares about William. Can she ever find her father and make it back to the present to heal her sister? And when the time comes to leave, will she want to?

I like the premise for the series and am certainly interested to see where it goes from here. The time travel theory was one that I had not heard before, but it posed some interesting challenges, and it certainly made me wonder how it would work out in the end--particularly the conundrum of having a physical body simultaneously in two timelines, yet only one spirit to inhabit them (and thus able to die if something should happen to either body). The one thing that I struggled to suspend my disbelief over--and only because I love languages--is that Middle English is not modern English. Between the lexicon, cadence, and sentence structure, the inhabitants of the 1300's would have been pretty much incomprehensible to Marian, and vice versa. I do think that could have been a really interesting problem for Marian to overcome, along with the other significant cultural differences that she encounters.  

I liked Marian, but she falls in love awfully quickly--within two weeks, she's willing to set aside her entire life for a near-stranger of a completely different time and culture, though with no guarantee she can stay in either time period. If you like steamy romance, though, this would fit the bill. Marian's story concludes well enough to stand on its own; some related threads are left open for Ellen's story in the next book, but there's no cliffhanger to worry about.

Thank you Revell and NetGalley for the complimentary e-book. I was not required to write a positive review, and all opinions are my own.

"The Heart's Charge" by Karen Witemeyer--Hanger's Horsemen, book 2

Members of Hanger's Horsemen, Mark Wallace and Jonah Brooks arrive in Llano County, Texas, to deliver a steed, never expecting they'd deliver a baby as well. Left with an infant to care for, they head to a nearby foundling home, where Mark encounters the woman he'd nearly married a decade ago. After failing at love, Katherine Palmer dedicated her life to caring for children, teaming up with Eliza Southerland to start Harmony House. From mixed ancestry, illegitimate, and female, Eliza understands the pain of not fitting society's mold. Yet those are the very attributes that lead her to minister to outcast children. The taciturn Jonah intrigues her with his courage and kindness, but there are secrets behind his eyes--ghosts from wars past and others still being waged. However, when a handful of urchin children from the area go missing, a pair of Horsemen are exactly what the women need. Working together to find the children, will these two couples find love as well?

I always enjoy Karen Witemeyer's books. The humor, the heart-felt story, the loveable characters. For a book with four protagonists, I found it nicely balanced between the four perspectives; I didn't feel that one couple was given preference over the other. And I liked that it was truly one story--not a different plot thread for each couple, but rather a cohesive whole, with everyone working together for a common goal. 

The multi-racial cast was very well done. Jonah and Eliza were well thought out in how they were portrayed; they don't feel like white characters of a different color. They don't react the same way as their white comrades. They often compensate for the expected prejudice, and Jonah especially is careful to avoid situations that could be misconstrued. He doesn't let Mark run the show--he chooses to interact with local lawmen regardless of the prejudice he might encounter. But he is careful in what he says, how he reacts, and who he is willing to be alone with. 

Over all, a fun story!

Thank you Bethany House and NetGalley for the complimentary e-book. I was not required to write a positive review, and all opinions are my own. 

Hanger's Horsemen
1. At Love's Command
2. The Heart's Charge
3. In Honor's Defense

"On the Cliffs of Foxglove Manor" by Jaime Jo Wright

1885: Adria Fontaine has been sent to recover goods her father pirated on the Great Lakes during the war. But when she arrives at Foxglove Manor--a stone house on a cliff overlooking Lake Superior--Adria senses wickedness hovering over the property. The mistress of Foxglove is an eccentric and seemingly cruel old woman who has filled her house with dangerous secrets, ones that may cost Adria her life.

Present day: Kailey Gibson is a new nurse's aide at a senior home in a renovated old stone manor. Kidnapped as a child, she has nothing but locked-up memories of secrets and death, overshadowed by the chilling promise from her abductors that they would return. When the residents of Foxglove start sharing stories of whispers in the night, hidden treasure, and a love willing to kill, it becomes clear this home is far from a haven. She'll have to risk it all to banish the past's demons, including her own.

Treasure hunts, conspiracies, and a haunted mansion . . . This is the closest thing to a ghost story I've ever read in fiction without an actual supernatural element. While I knew there couldn't be an actual ghost, there had to be some explanation for people seeing the same apparition over a hundred years apart--and I loved how it all tied together as variations on a theme! Jaime Jo Wright writes the most complex stories--not complicated and confusing, but truly complex, with an incredible attention to the details that are interwoven and connected throughout the book, even (or especially?) across timelines. 

The setting is marvelous. Having lived along the shore of Superior for several years, I can picture the haunting landscape perfectly, from the brooding lake to the high, windy cliffs to the sea caves. It's no wonder both Kailey and Adria feel the desolation the lake can inspire. Of course, both heroines are fighting their own battles with trauma, heightened by the manipulation around them. If you're looking for a superb Gothic tale of suspense that spans more than a century, look no further!

Thank you Bethany House and NetGalley for the complimentary e-book. I was not required to write a positive review, and all opinions are my own.

Bethany Turner's "Plot Twist"

February 4, 2003, promises to be a typical day for Olivia Ross—a greeting card writer whose passion project is a screenplay of her own. But after she and a handsome actor have a magical meet-cute in a coffee shop, they make a spontaneous pact: in ten years, after they’ve found the success they’re just sure they’re going to achieve, they’ll return to the coffeehouse to partner up and make a film together. The only problem? Olivia neglected to get the stranger’s name. But she doesn’t forget his face—or the date. Every February 4 for the next ten years, Olivia has a day full of coincidences and ironies. As men come and go and return to her life, she continues to write, but still wonders about the guy from the coffee shop—the nameless actor she’s almost certain has turned out to be Hamish MacDougal, now a famous A-lister and Hollywood leading man. But a lot can happen in ten years, and while waiting for the curtain to rise on her fate, the true story of Olivia’s life is being written—and if she’s not careful, she’ll completely miss the real-life romantic comedy playing out right before her eyes.

This was a fun story, with the feel of a classic rom-com, yet it's also subverted: meet-cutes and plot devices that one would expect to follow the classic patterns don't always. There were definitely twists I didn't see coming (and some I did), but one of the biggest twists on a rom-com is that this is as much a story about friendship as it is romance. Olivia's long-term friendship with Fiona is one of the most important things in her life, and regardless of the pain it may cause her, she will put their friendship first--even before love. 

I enjoyed that the book took place almost entirely on February 4th each year over a decade; it reminded me a bit of the film Groundhog's Day, with Olivia's inability to escape the "curse" of weirdly coincidental encounters each year. She makes some selfish decisions, some selfless decisions, and sometimes has no idea how to react to the weirdness. Over all, I quite enjoyed it. It was clean and funny, tugged the heartstrings, and was a welcome diversion from a particularly busy season! 

Thank you Thomas Nelson and NetGalley for the complimentary e-book. I was not required to write a positive review, and all opinions are my own.

"Paint and Nectar" by Ashley Clark - Heirloom Secrets, book 2

In 1929, a spark forms between talented watercolorist Eliza and William, a charming young man who has been hired to forge her popular paintings. Her aunt makes it clear Eliza should stay away from him because of a feud over missing heirloom silver. But the source of the rivalry was long ago, and the two fall in love. William regrets the job that desperation led him to take and their families' ongoing bitterness, but setting things right comes at a cost. In present-day Charleston, Lucy Legare has just inherited an old house along with all the secrets it holds, possibly including an old silver heirloom. Declan Pinckney is determined to buy the house for his family's development company. But as Lucy uncovers secrets about the house, garden, and silver, she becomes more determined than ever to preserve the historic Charleston property, not only for history's sake but also for her own.

As is often the case with two storylines, I confess to finding myself more invested in one than the other--in this case, the historical timeline more than the contemporary. How can one resist a forger falling in love with the artist he's forging? I was actually quite surprised by how their story turned out, especially given the way facts revealed in the contemporary timeline made things appear for a while!

I did struggle to understand the exact connections between storylines. It's probably more my fault than the author's--I was pretty exhausted when I read the book (and fell asleep for a while about a third of the way in), and I suspect it strongly affected my comprehension. I also might have been more invested if I knew anything about Charleston or antique silver. But as an artist who loves botanicals, I most certainly appreciated Eliza's occupation and subject matter!

I enjoyed all the connections to The Dress Shop on King Street--while I don't think one would have to read that book first, there are a lot more connections than I anticipated between the two stories. It makes me wonder if book 3 will be so thoroughly intertwined as well! I recognized a bit of set-up for it, especially near the end.

Thank you Bethany House and NetGalley for the complimentary e-book. I was not required to write a positive review, and all opinions are my own.

Heirloom Secrets
1. The Dress Shop on King Street
2. Paint and Nectar

"The Paris Betrayal" by James R Hannibal

After a rough mission in Rome involving the discovery of a devastating bioweapon, Company spy Ben Calix returns to Paris to find his perfectly ordered world has collapsed. A sniper attack. An ambush. A call for help that brings French SWAT forces down on his head. Ben is out. This is a severance--reserved for incompetents and traitors. Searching for answers and anticipating a coming attack, Ben and a woman swept up in his misfortunes must travel across Europe to find the sniper who tried to kill him, the medic who saved his life, the schoolmaster who trained him, and an upstart hacker from his former team. More than that, Ben must come to grips with his own insignificance as the Company's plan to stop Leviathan from unleashing the bioweapon at any cost moves forward without him--and he struggles against the infection that is swiftly claiming territory within his own body.

One thing I have gathered from the books I've read by James Hannibal, you can count on a fast-paced international thriller with plenty of twists and turns. The villains are so clever you'd think the hero has no chance--until it proves that the good guys are cleverer yet. 

The story seems to be set post-corona--there are references to the pandemic, but more so in past tense. At this point I'm pretty sick of anything pandemic-related, but it didn't bother me in this book--rather surprising, given that the plot centers on weaponizing plague. But that's the power of engaging characters and captivating plots. I loved how this book continued to surprise me. It would make a great action movie. The author tosses in the occasional spy tip, and the weird thing is, some of them are actually practical for everyday life--like how to survive going through the ice on frozen lake. 

While the story never mentions God or Christianity, it has an allegorical feel; it wasn't until I read the author's notes at the end that I discovered that the story derives a lot from the book of Job (which sounds strange, given this is a spy thriller, but it actually works).

Thank you Revell and NetGalley for the complimentary e-book. I was not required to write a positive review, and all opinions are my own.

"The Nature of a Lady" by Roseanna M White - The Secrets of the Isles, book 1

Lady Elizabeth "Libby" Sinclair, with her love of microscopes and nature, isn't favored in society. She flees to the beautiful Isles of Scilly for the summer and stumbles into the dangerous secrets left behind by her holiday cottage's former occupant, also named Elizabeth, who mysteriously vanished. Oliver Tremayne--gentleman and clergyman--is determined to discover what happened to his sister, and he's happy to accept the help of the girl now living in what should have been Beth's summer cottage . . . especially when he realizes it's the curious young lady he met briefly two years ago, who shares his love of botany and biology. But the hunt for his sister involves far more than nature walks, and he can't quite believe all the secrets Beth had been keeping from him. As Libby and Oliver work together, they find ancient legends, pirate wrecks, betrayal, and the most mysterious phenomenon of all: love.

As one who enjoys botany, I was looking forward to an in-depth look at naturalists of the early 1900's. While it is a subject important to both Libby and Oliver, lets just say the story turned in a different--but plenty exciting--direction: towards local lore and pirates and treasure hunts. I was surprised to discover that the pirate John Mucknell--commissioned by the Prince of Wales in exile himself--is an actual part of the history of the Isles of Scilly (even if the treasure was fiction). As they say, sometimes truth is stranger than fiction!

Oliver is as sweet and kind as can be (when not dealing with his arch nemesis, at least), an excellent match for Libby. Libby lacks confidence early in the book, but she grows more of a backbone as time goes on. If I had a problem with the story, it's that Libby's lady's aid, Mabena, is a supremely compelling character--to the point that she overshadowed Libby, and I wanted to skip ahead to Mabena's parts. A decent portion of the book is from her point of view, and she has a fascinating backstory so at odds with her current appearance and profession. And an equally entertaining romance.

I'm excited to spend more time with the characters! Hopefully we'll be seeing a lot more of Beth and Sheridan and Emily in the books to come. I suspect certain disreputable characters will continue to make life difficult for them as well.

Thank you Bethany House and NetGalley for the complimentary e-book. I was not required to write a positive review, and all opinions are my own.

Secrets of the Isles
1. The Nature of a Lady
2. To Treasure an Heiress
3. Worthy of Legend