Starting December 1st: 12 Days of Clean Romance Promotion

12 Days of Clean Romance Promotion

Participating Authors & Schedule

$100 Blast - December 1st

* - * - * - *- * - *- * - * - *

Each of these authors will be featured on the date listed below ($25 giveaway x 12 authors = $300)
Jennifer Peel - December 4th
Taylor Hart - December 5th
Rachael Anderson - December 6th
Josi Kilpack - December 7th
Janette Rallison - December 8th
Jennifer Griffith - December 9th
Taylor Dean - December 11th
Sheralyn Pratt - December 12th
Heather Moore - December 13th
Annette Larsen - December 14th
Lucy McConnell - December 15th
Cami Checketts - December 16th

If you're a blogger looking for details on how to participate visit http://www.iamareader.com/12-days-of-clean-romance-blogger-sign-ups

If you are not a blogger then stop by I Am A Reader and hosting blogs (like An Imperfect Christian Mom) starting December 1st to enter the giveaways!!

Good luck to all who participate!

Samson Teaser Trailer

Synopsis from Samson official movie website:

SAMSON is based on the powerful, biblical epic of a champion chosen by God to deliver Israel. His supernatural strength and impulsive decisions quickly pit him against the oppressive Philistine empire. After being betrayed by a wicked prince and a beautiful temptress, Samson is captured and blinded by his enemies. Samson calls upon his God once more for supernatural strength and turns imprisonment and blindness into final victory.

Reprint: The Importance of Family Traditions by J. M. Hochstetler

Focusing on the family will be our theme for December. In anticipation, here is an excellent article from Joan M. Hochstetler, whose books I enjoy. The article originally appeared on The Busy Mom's Daily blog (my previous endeavor) in 2015 and still rings true now. Wishing you and your family many blessings this holiday season.

When my daughters were tiny, with the holidays fast approaching, I impulsively decided that on the night of Christmas Eve, when they were fast asleep, I would hang candy canes all over our tree as a sign that Santa had come. Well, that idea turned out to be a huge success. When my little girls ran downstairs that Christmas morning, they were so excited to find the treats on the tree that I knew I’d come up with a very special tradition.

Over the years, as holidays came and went, I continued my secret Christmas Eve ritual. As they grew older, however, the children appeared to take less and less notice of the candy canes. They would eat only a few, and then after we took the tree down I ended up throwing most of them away. It seemed a waste. So one Christmas I thoughtlessly came very close to letting that tradition die.

That year I was so busy with holiday preparations and the day-to-day routine that I kept forgetting to pick up a package of candy canes at the store. It seemed like such a simple, unimportant thing. The girls were too old to care about my little tradition anymore, I told myself and I shrugged off the quiet voice that nagged at me to get those candy canes!

One evening just a couple of days before Christmas, I was rushing around the house, as usual, burdened with too many holiday preparations. In spite of my preoccupation, I happened to notice my oldest daughter, Jennifer, who sat on the stairs with my youngest, Katie. Both were snuggled in their nightgowns, slippers, and robes, happily taking in our cozy living room before heading off to bed.

Below them, fire blazed on the hearth and colored lights twinkled on the tree. Holiday decorations were arranged everywhere, and pine garlands and tiny white lights draped the mantel as well as the banister on either side where they sat. The scene was so perfect that I stopped for just a moment to breathe in the heady scents of pine and spices and to bask in the room’s glow. And as I lingered, I overheard what the girls were whispering about.

“Now, you know,” Jennifer told her little sister, “on Christmas morning when Santa comes, he always hangs candy canes all over the tree.”

Katie’s eyes grew round. “Always?” she breathed, in sweet expectancy.

“Oh, yes, always,” Jennifer assured her with the easy confidence of a big sister. “There will be candy canes all over the tree on Christmas morning. You’ll see.”

My heart almost stopped. One look at my daughters’ faces told me that I’d better plan on a special trip to the store the very next day. And suddenly gratitude flooded over me at the realization that the Lord had pulled me up short from my preoccupation with all the things that seemed so urgent to remind me of something I had come way too close to missing—a tradition that was genuinely meaningful to my children.

On that Christmas morning and every Christmas morning since then to this very day, candy canes have adorned my Christmas tree. My grown children expect to see them there when they arrive Christmas morning every bit as much as my grandchildren now do. It’s a tradition I wouldn’t think of ending. Because of that simple, long-ago impulse and the Lord’s reminder to be faithful in its observance, my family is making memories that in one form or another will be passed down to coming generations. It’s a simple thing as many of our traditions are, but oh, how meaningful!

An award-winning author and editor, Joan M. Hochstetler is the daughter of Mennonite farmers. She grew up in central Indiana and graduated from Indiana University cum laude with a degree in Germanic Languages. Her contemporary novel One Holy Night was the Christian Small Publishers 2009 Book of the Year and a finalist for the American Christian Fiction Writers 2009 Carol Award. She is a member of American Christian Fiction Writers, Colonial America Christian Writers, and Middle Tennessee Christian Writers and contributes to the Colonial Quills and Novel Pastimes blogs.

In her everyday persona as Joan Shoup, she is the publisher and editorial director of Sheaf House Publishers, a specialty small press headquartered in the Elkhart, Indiana, area.

Joan enjoys spending time with her husband, a retired United Methodist pastor, and with her children and grandchildren; gardening; crafts; traveling; researching her latest projects; and, of course, writing.

Visit Joan online at www.jmhochstetler.com

Mailbox Monday - November 27

Mailbox Monday is a meme started by Marcia of To Be Continued. Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came in their mailbox during the last week. It now has a permanent home at the Mailbox Monday blog.

Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles, and humongous wish lists.

How can it be the end of November? I swear the year just started.

I hope everyone had a blessed Thanksgiving. We sure did. Family came over on Thursday and then again on Sunday. In between, we helped with our church's annual Christmas bazaar.

As for reading material, I really made out this past week. This came from an Amazon pre-order....

Millions of readers of Little House on the Prairie believe they know Laura Ingalls--the pioneer girl who survived blizzards and near-starvation on the Great Plains, and the woman who wrote the famous autobiographical books. But the true story of her life has never been fully told. The Little House books were not only fictionalized but brilliantly edited, a profound act of myth-making and self-transformation. Now, drawing on unpublished manuscripts, letters, diaries, and land and financial records, Caroline Fraser--the editor of the Library of America edition of the Little House series--masterfully fills in the gaps in Wilder's biography, setting the record straight regarding charges of ghostwriting that have swirled around the books and uncovering the grown-up story behind the most influential childhood epic of pioneer life.

Set against nearly a century of epochal change, from the Homestead Act and the Indian Wars to the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression, Wilder's dramatic life provides a unique perspective on American history and our national mythology of self-reliance. Settling on the frontier amidst land-rush speculation, Wilder's family encountered Biblical tribulations of locusts and drought, fire and ruin. Deep in debt after a series of personal tragedies, including the loss of a child and her husband's stroke, Wilder uprooted herself again, crisscrossing the country and turning to menial work to support her family. In middle age, she began writing a farm advice column, prodded by her self-taught journalist daughter. And at the age of sixty, after losing nearly everything in the Depression, she turned to children's books, recasting her hardscrabble childhood as a triumphal vision of homesteading--and achieving fame and fortune in the process, in one of the most astonishing rags-to-riches stories in American letters.

Offering fresh insight and new discoveries about Wilder's life and times, Prairie Fires reveals the complex woman who defined the American pioneer character, and whose artful blend of fact and fiction grips us to this day.

Then I lucked out at the church's tag sale and found these three from Tracie Peterson's Heirs of Montana series....

This is the blurb for the first book, Land of My Heart:  Adventurers, families, outlaws...all driven west in the 1860s by a longing for endless blue sky along with wild and wide-open spaces. Tracie Peterson, from her own Montana home, paints an unforgettable portrait of this rich, rugged landscape, populated by strong and spirited characters. When Dianne Chadwick urges her family to move west to her uncle's ranch in the Montana Territory, she has no idea that her new life in the rugged frontier ~and even within her uncle's home~ will not be the idyllic adventure she expects. But first she has to survive the arduous wagon journey with the help of guide Cole Selby, whose heart seems to be as hard as the mountains he loves.

Recently, I reconnected with a good friend and talented author who I consider a mentor. She gifted me a copy of her latest book.

Life had changed drastically for Rachel since the accident, but none of the changes had prepared her for what followed. She wasn’t even sure when it started. She knew only that the darkness appeared more often and lasted longer, accompanied by forgetfulness, fear, confusion…even suspicion.

As a result of the accident—which she was certain was entirely her fault—her husband of nearly 45 years was now a semi-invalid, his dependence on her growing by the day. Their only child, a grown daughter named Lilly, lived hours away and was dealing with difficulties of her own, not the least of which was an unwanted divorce. Rachel, however, had no concept of Lilly’s suffering, instead believing her 35-year-old daughter was still a college coed with her entire life ahead of her.

Can this fractured family find its way to a place of healing, or will the darkness prevail, destroying them all in its unrelenting torment? Unconditional love seems to be their only hope…but how are they to get there?

For my Kindle I bought the following inspirational story collection...

and also this book I have been dying to read....

I hope you'll share your mailbox with me too. Enjoy your week!

Mailbox Monday - November 20

Mailbox Monday is a meme started by Marcia of To Be Continued. Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came in their mailbox during the last week. It now has a permanent home at the Mailbox Monday blog.

Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles, and humongous wish lists.

Happy Thanksgiving week! Not sure what your plans are but mine involve cleaning, baking, and spending time with my family. I'm working today and have a class tomorrow morning, but I'm hoping to be off after after that until next week. Annual Christmas bazaar at church is slated for this coming Saturday from 9 to 3.

As far as reading materials go, I received a couple of great books for review and also picked up a resource I found at the Write Angles Conference I attended on Saturday.

Can a religious separatist and an opportunistic spy make it in the New World?
A brand new series for fans of all things related to history, romance, adventure, faith, and family trees.

Mary Elizabeth Chapman boards the Speedwell in 1620 as a Separatist seeking a better life in the New World. William Lytton embarks on the Mayflower as a carpenter looking for opportunities to succeed—and he may have found one when a man from the Virginia Company offers William a hefty sum to keep a stealth eye on company interests in the new colony. The season is far too late for good sailing and storms rage, but reaching land is no better as food is scarce and the people are weak. Will Mary Elizabeth survive to face the spring planting and unknown natives? Will William be branded a traitor and expelled?

Join the adventure as the Daughters of the Mayflower series begins with The Mayflower Bride by Kimberley Woodhouse.

The inimitable Faith Fairchild returns in a chilling New England whodunit, inspired by the best Agatha Christie mysteries and with hints of the timeless board game Clue.

For most of her adult life, resourceful caterer Faith Fairchild has called the sleepy Massachusetts village of Aleford home. While the native New Yorker has come to know the region well, she isn’t familiar with Havencrest, a privileged enclave, until the owner of Rowan House, a secluded sprawling Arts and Crafts mansion, calls her about catering a weekend house party.

Producer/director of a string of hit musicals, Max Dane—a Broadway legend—is throwing a lavish party to celebrate his seventieth birthday. At the house as they discuss the event, Faith’s client makes a startling confession. "I didn’t hire you for your cooking skills, fine as they may be, but for your sleuthing ability. You see, one of the guests wants to kill me."

Faith’s only clue is an ominous birthday gift the man received the week before—an empty casket sent anonymously containing a twenty-year-old Playbill from Max’s last, and only failed, production—Heaven or Hell. Consequently, Max has drawn his guest list for the party from the cast and crew. As the guests begin to arrive one by one, and an ice storm brews overhead, Faith must keep one eye on the menu and the other on her host to prevent his birthday bash from becoming his final curtain call.

Full of delectable recipes, brooding atmosphere, and Faith’s signature biting wit, The Body in the Casket is a delightful thriller that echoes the beloved mysteries of Agatha Christie and classic films such as Murder by Death and Deathtrap.

Americans have long regarded the freedom of travel a central tenet of citizenship. Yet, in the United States, freedom of movement has historically been a right reserved for whites. In this book, Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor shows that African Americans fought obstructions to their mobility over 100 years before Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus. These were "colored travelers," activists who relied on steamships, stagecoaches, and railroads to expand their networks and to fight slavery and racism. They refused to ride in "Jim Crow" railroad cars, fought for the right to hold a U.S. passport (and citizenship), and during their transatlantic voyages, demonstrated their radical abolitionism. By focusing on the myriad strategies of black protest, including the assertions of gendered freedom and citizenship, this book tells the story of how the basic act of traveling emerged as a front line in the battle for African American equal rights before the Civil War.

Drawing on exhaustive research from U.S. and British newspapers, journals, narratives, and letters, as well as firsthand accounts of such figures as Frederick Douglass, Harriet Jacobs, and William Wells Brown, Pryor illustrates how, in the quest for citizenship, colored travelers constructed ideas about respectability and challenged racist ideologies that made black mobility a crime.

I hope you'll share your mailbox with us. Wishing you a blessed Thanksgiving.

Book Review: When the Bishop Needs an Alibi by Vannetta Chapman

Bishop Henry Lapp, Emma Fisher, and more familiar faces return in When the Bishop Needs an Alibi, the second book in Vannetta Chapman's Amish Bishop Mystery series.

Henry and Emma find themselves in the middle of another mystery when he discovers the body of a young woman while visiting the Monte Vista National Wildlife Refuge to witness the annual arrival of 20,000 sandhill cranes to the San Luis Valley of Colorado.

When Henry quickly becomes the primary murder suspect, it seems like God is calling him to use his special talent to help in the investigation. He realizes his involvement in discovering the truth could put those he cares about in the path of a dangerous killer who will stop at nothing to make sure Henry is framed for murder.

As much as I enjoyed the first book in this series, What the Bishop Saw, I loved this one more. Faith, friendship, and courage blend together to create an engaging story that pulls you in immediately. It's wonderful to watch Henry and Emma's relationship evolve in the second novel. In addition, the strong ties that bind this community together add a meaningful dynamic to the story. Chapman continues to fascinate me with her ability to weave an amazing story that keeps you riveted and also touches your heart.

I can't wait for Who the Bishop Knows, which is due out this spring. I highly recommend this series to lovers of Amish fiction and cozy mysteries.

Paperback: 352 pages
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers (September 1, 2017)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0736966498
ISBN-13: 978-0736966498

I received a copy of this book from the author. This review contains my honest opinions, which I have not been compensated for in any way.

Mailbox Monday - Nov 6

Mailbox Monday is a meme started by Marcia of To Be Continued. Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came in their mailbox during the last week. It now has a permanent home at the Mailbox Monday blog.

Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles, and humongous wish lists.

A busy week it was in this neck of the woods. Sold a house, enjoyed some trick or treaters, the dog and the Lil' Princess celebrated birthdays, and I am preparing for numerous closings coming up this month.

Nothing in my mailbox but I did pick up this short Deputy Tempe Crabtree story from one of my favorite authors--Marilyn Meredith.

When a body is discovered in the hills, Deputy Tempe Crabtree is called to the scene. The victim is Claude Forester who claims to be a reincarnated Native American medicine man. Several members of the local tribe have reason to dislike him, but who is responsible for his death?

You can pick up your copy at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0774QGQK1

What was in your mailbox? Hope you'll share.