REVIEW: Be Light by Samuel Rodriguez

About the Book

The Blueprint for Overcoming Darkness and Living in God’s Light.

Our world unravels more each day. It feels as if we’re drowning in a sea churning with greed, violence, and lust. As darkness advances, hope dims.
 
Yet within that reality, God gives us a profound mandate...
 
             Be Light.
 
Light has always defined God and his followers. At creation, God spoke light into existence. Jesus is the light of the world. And we are born to absorb and then reflect God’s light. 
 
In Be Light Samuel Rodriguez--described by Fox News and CNN as “America’s most influential Latino Evangelical leader”--provides a blueprint for confronting darkness in every realm of our lives. He issues a clarion call for individual believers and the church to rise up and once again be that bright city on a hill, which doesn’t simply expose the invading darkness, but overcomes it with God’s blazing light.




















My Review

Be Light was a refreshing read, but yet nothing new to me. I recently discovered Pastor Rodriguez on youtube and when I saw Be Light return to blogging for books I had to review it. The book is what he calls the "blueprint for overcoming darkness and being the light". Again, while nothing in this book was new to me it was a good refresher and would be a great book for any new believers. 

REVIEW: A Stranger at Fellsworth by Sarah E. Ladd

About the Book

Could losing everything be the best thing to happen to Annabelle Thorley? 

In the fallout of her deceased father’s financial ruin, Annabelle’s prospects are looking bleak. Her fiancé has called off their betrothal, and now she remains at the mercy of her controlling and often cruel brother. Annabelle soon faces the fact that her only hope for a better life is to do the unthinkable and run away to Fellsworth, the home of her long-estranged aunt and uncle, where a teaching position awaits her. Working for a wage for the first time in her life forces Annabelle to adapt to often unpleasant situations as friendships and roles she’s taken for granted are called into question. 

Owen Locke is unswerving in his commitments. As a widower and father, he is fiercely protective of his only daughter. As an industrious gamekeeper, he is intent on keeping poachers at bay even though his ambition has always been to eventually purchase land that he can call his own. When a chance encounter introduces him to the lovely Annabelle Thorley, his steady life is shaken. For the first time since his wife’s tragic death, Owen begins to dream of a second chance at love. 

As Owen and Annabelle grow closer, ominous forces threaten the peace they thought they’d found. Poachers, mysterious strangers, and murderers converge at Fellsworth, forcing Annabelle and Owen to a test of fortitude and bravery to stop the shadow of the past from ruining their hopes for the future.

My Review

Through out reading this series I've had mixed feelings about it. The first book was fantastic, the second book was good but not as great as the first. And this book was a great conclusion to this beautiful regency series. Filled to the brim with mystery, romance, and beautiful descriptions. Although I was not suprised at how good this series was. Sarah's previous regency series is even better than this one so I highly recommend that series as well as this one. 

REVIEW: The Hideaway by Lauren K. Denton

About the Book

When her grandmother’s will wrenches Sara back home from New Orleans, she learns more about Margaret Van Buren in the wake of her death than she ever did in life.

After her last remaining family member dies, Sara Jenkins goes home to The Hideaway, her grandmother Mags's ramshackle B&B in Sweet Bay, Alabama. She intends to quickly tie up loose ends then return to her busy life and thriving antique shop in New Orleans. Instead, she learns Mags has willed her The Hideaway and charged her with renovating it—no small task considering Mags’s best friends, a motley crew of senior citizens, still live there.

Rather than hurrying back to New Orleans, Sara stays in Sweet Bay and begins the biggest house-rehabbing project of her career. Amid Sheetrock dust, old memories, and a charming contractor, she discovers that slipping back into life at The Hideaway is easier than she expected.

Then she discovers a box Mags left in the attic with clues to a life Sara never imagined for her grandmother. With help from Mags’s friends, Sara begins to piece together the mysterious life of bravery, passion, and choices that changed Mags’s destiny in both marvelous and devastating ways.

When an opportunistic land developer threatens to seize The Hideaway, Sara is forced to make a choice—stay in Sweet Bay and fight for the house and the people she’s grown to love or leave again and return to her successful but solitary life in New Orleans. 

My Review

The Hideaway is a sweetly charming debut novel by Lauren K. Denton. The Hideaway is set in the deep South and begins with Sara going back to her grandmother's estate in Alabama called The Hideaway. Sara planned to return to her shop in New Orleans but that soon changes when she finds her grandmother has left The Hideaway to her in her will and wants Sara to renovate it. During renovations Sara discovers a box in attic from what seems her grandmother Mag's previous life. Sara is then thrust into putting the puzzle pieces of her grandmother's mysterious life together.  I ended up really enjoying this novel. Generational stories, romance, mystery, and southern charm.  Note to Christian readers::: While this novel was published by Thomas Nelson I wouldn't consider it Christian fiction, but rather General fiction. Also adultry is a major theme in this story.