Tea & Read: A Noble Groom

Title: A Noble Groom
Author: Jody Hedlund
Genre: Christian Historical Fiction
Rating: One Cup of Tea (★★★)

This is the first book I've read from Jody Hedlund. I must admit that the cover of this book drew me in more than the storyline. 

Recently widowed Annalisa Werner has the feeling her husband was murdered but can't prove it. Alone with her young daughter in 1881 Michigan, she has six months left to finish raising the money needed to pay back the land contract her husband purchased, and the land is difficult to toil by herself. She needs a husband. With unmarried men scarce, her father sends a letter to his brother in the Old Country, asking him to find Annalisa a groom.

For nobleman Carl von Reichert, the blade of the guillotine is his fate. He's been accused and convicted of a serious crime he didn't commit, and his only escape is to flee to a small German community in Michigan where he'll be safe. He secures a job on Annalisa's farm but bumbles through learning about farming and manual labor.

Annalisa senses that Karl is harboring a secret about his past, yet she finds herself drawn to him anyway. He's gentle, kind, and romantic--unlike any of the men she's ever known. He begins to restore her faith in the ability to love--but her true groom is still on his way. And time is running out on them all.

This book has the basics right. Carl and Annalisa are great characters. I liked Annalisa's balanced character. She was both tough and tender. I loved her drive to save her farm, but that fact that she recognized that she needed help. Carl really does exemplify the title. He really was noble and heartwarming. His caring nature won me over from the time he was introduced. The writing was good and flowed easily and the authors treatment of classicism was believable and added depth to the story. 

My lower rating comes from the fact that the pace of the book was quite slow to me. I didn't quite feel the drive to finish it, although it was enjoyable while I was reading it. A couple of the plot lines were very predictable but were saved by the strength of the characters.

This was an easy, but enjoyable read. I would venture to read other books by Hedlund. 

Tea & Read: Flight of Earls

Title: Flight of Earls

Author: Michael K. Reynolds

Genre: Historical Christian Fiction

Rating: I’d throw it against the wall if it wasn’t on my Kindle (★)

I have a method for selecting the books I read. I read the back cover blurb first and then a few sample pages. I almost never buy a book from the reviews. Sometimes, after I read a book, I look at the reviews to see how my assessment of a book falls with everyone else. For this book, however, I did the reverse. I read the reviews of this book first and decided based on the reviews.

I’m never doing that again.

Blurb:

It’s 1846 in Ireland. When her family’s small farm is struck by famine, Clare Hanley and her younger brother, Seamus, set out across the ocean to the Promised Land of America.

Five years prior, Clare’s older sister Margaret and her Uncle Tomas emigrated in similar fashion and were not to be heard from again. But Clare must face her fears as she lands in the coming-of-age city of New York. There she discovers love, adventure, tragedy, and a terrible secret which threatens to destroy her family and all she believes.

Flight of the Earls is the first book in a historical novel trilogy based on Irish immigration in the 1840s.

This book was so unlike the reviews I read that I initially thought I was reading for the wrong book. First, let me say that the writing (I’m mean grammar and sentence structure) is not terrible. As a matter of fact, there are many passages with incredible imagery. There were times that I could almost smell the scenes being described.

Unfortunately, that’s as far as my admiration of this book went. The plot was slow and disjointed. At times, I felt I was just reading a random bunch of scenes of Clare and Semus’ life.  I found myself not caring about the characters. Since the story started with the potatoes famine, I found myself wondering about that plotline that the rest of the story. I skimmed quite a bit, and sadly, it didn’t appear that I’d missed anything in the story development by doing so.

I guess I’m just going to have to go against the tide of great review with mine.  

Tea & Read: With Every Letter

Title: With Every Letter
Author: Sarah Sundin
Genre: Historical Christian Fiction
Rating: Two Cups of Tea

With Every Letter is Book 1 in Sarah Sundin's Wings of Nightingale series. If this book is any indication of how the rest of the series is going to be, I'm so in!

Blurb:
Lt. Mellie Blake is a nurse serving in the 802nd Medical Squadron, Air Evacuation, Transport. As part of a morale building program, she reluctantly enters into an anonymous correspondence with Lt. Tom MacGilliver, an officer in the 908th Engineer Aviation Battalion in North Africa. As their letters crisscross the Atlantic, Tom and Mellie develop a unique friendship despite not knowing the other's true identity. When both are transferred to Algeria, the two are poised to meet face to face for the first time. Will they overcome their fears and reveal who they are, or will their future be held hostage to their past? And can they learn to trust God and embrace the gift of love he offers them?

I admit that my first impressions of this novel weren't enthusiastic. I thought it started off a little slow. Also, I thought the some of the characters internal issues were a little bit far fetched and trivial. I kept reading however, because I knew Sundin wouldn't disappoint and she didn't. 

Despite my initial feelings, they changed 1/3 way into the book. The pacing picked up nicely. Also, the character arcs, although they started in a place I didn't enjoy, moved at a believable rate. That's one of the things I love about Sundin's books: her character transformations are very realistic. Instead of the character's having one big Aha! moment, they change gradually and each scene builds another support of that change. I think this technique allows me as the reader to see how the characters actually live out the change they go through. I also love that the epiphany isn't within the last 20 pages of the book. It comes earlier. I really enjoy that.

As for historical detail, Sundin is fantastic. She has a gift for transporting me from the present and putting me right in time with the characters. No glaring historical problems in her books. I also loved that the movie, The Shop Around the Corner, is a part of the book (You've God Mail is the modern day adaption and I LOVE that movie). 

I am looking forward to the next book in the series.