Scraps of Evidence by Barbara Cameron

When Tess Villanova's best friend, Samantha, is murdered on Senior Prom night, Tess sets her mind and heart to finding her killer. Now, at age 28, she is a detective with the St. Augustine Police department and has just joined forces with a new partner--the handsome Logan McMillan. Logan is new to sunny Florida, so, along with solving a horrific murder, the partners investigate many of the local eateries and take in the sights of the historic town-- St. Augustine actually seemed like one of the characters, with its old world charm and tourist attractions.

Tess' Aunt Susan is more like a mother than an aunt to Tess, owns a quilt shop, and shares her love of the craft of quilting with Tess. Quilting helps Tess unwind from the stress of "the job". Her latest has become something of a "quilt therapy" project to honor her friend Samantha.

Scraps of Evidence falls on the edgier side of the Quilts of Love line published by Abingdon Press. Along with the presence of a serial killer are themes of domestic abuse that lend a darker feel to the series.

Barbara Cameron knows how to put the pieces together in a page turner/romance that fans of detective stories will love.

This is a winner!
For more about Scraps of Evidence and Barbara Cameron read on!

This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

Scraps of Evidence

Abingdon Press (January 21, 2014)

by

Barbara Cameron


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:


A Word from the author:

CBD, CBA, and ECPA bestselling author of 35 books (including new series upcoming for Abingdon Press in 2011/2012) including fiction and non-fiction books for Abingdon Press, Thomas Nelson, Harlequin, and other publishers.


I sold three films to HBO/Cinemax and am the first winner of the Romance Writers of America Golden Heart Award.


My two novellas won the 2nd and 3rd place in the Inspirational Readers Choice Contest from the Faith, Love, and Hope chapter of RWA. Both were finalists for the novella category of the Carol Award of the American Christian Writers Award (ACFW).


ABOUT THE BOOK

Tess has taken some ribbing from her fellow officer, Logan, for her quilting hobby. He finds it hard to align the brisk professional officer he patrols with during the day with the one who quilts in her off-time. Besides, he’s been trying to get to know her better and he’d like to be seeing her during those few nights a week she spends with her quilting guild. Then one afternoon Tess and Logan visit her aunt in the nursing home, and the woman acts agitated when Tess covers her with the story quilt. Aunt Susan is attempting to communicate a message to them about Tess’s uncle. There’s a story behind this quilt, they realize, one that may lead them to a serial killer. Will they have a chance to have a future together, or will the killer choose Tess for his next victim before they find him?


If you would like to read the first chapter of , go HERE.

For the Love of Pete by Debby Mayne

For the love of Pete is a gentle novel in B&H Publishing's Bloomfield series. This one focuses on Bethany Hanahan, a middle aged widow, who returns to her home town after her husband dies of cancer. She is overwhelmed by loss, her overbearing mother, and a boatload of figurines. The clutter in her life reflects her low self esteem and perpetuates an inability to move on with her own life.

Pete is a sweetheart of a guy who has always had a thing for Bethany, and remained single in part because she was his ideal. He is also very organized...

Will Pete and Bethany be able to overcome the meddlers and the clutter in time to see what really matters?

I think that For the Love of Pete would appeal (especially) to empty nesters and women who like books about small town life.

On a personal note, I could relate to Bethany's feelings of insecurity and have been guilty of holding onto things because of sentimental or a perceived "value"... come to think of it, I still struggle with letting go of stuff...

For more information please read the following information from the wonderful people at B&H Publishing. :)

This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

For the Love of Pete

B&H Books (January 15, 2014)

by

Debby Mayne


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Debby Mayne is a best-selling author who has published more than 25 books and novellas, 400 short stories and articles, and devotions for women. She has also worked as managing editor of a national health magazine, product information writer for HSN, a creative writing instructor, and a copy editor and proofreader. Her novel, Love Finds You in Treasure Island, Florida received 4-1/2 stars from RT Book Review, and was named a Top Pick for the month of July. She and her husband Wally have two grown daughters, and live in Palm Harbor, Florida.


ABOUT THE BOOK

Widow Bethany Hanahan is trying in vain to fill an empty heart and an empty nest. The result is a home filled to the brim, but something is still missing. That’s when her new gardening club friends come to the rescue, encouraging her to let go of the past as well as the present clutter –emotional, spiritual, and physical. It’s not long before Bethany is finding friends, not bargains, to fill her days. But has her life become too full for someone like Pete Sprockett, a childhood friend, for whom her romantic feelings are beginning to bloom? Join the quirky, loving community of Bloomfield as they do what they do best – poke their well-meaning noses in and intervene in times of need –in author Debby Mayne’s second novel in what has become a five book series about a community where life is simple and love is real.



If you'd like to read the first chapter of For the Love of Pete, go HERE.

Songs of the Shenandoah by Michael K. Reynolds

Songs of the Shenandoah is the third and final book in the Heirs of Ireland series. The series chronicles an Irish family that comes to America to escape the potato famine but find different challenges as America's growing pains threaten the very fabric of their new homeland.

Issues such as slavery and succession inadvertently divide the Hanley family as the North and the South are set on a collision course of destruction and bloodshed.

Clare is the glue that has held the family together, but her husband's New York newspaper is falling apart fast as advertisers pull their support in protest of its stand against slavery.

Seamus and Ashlyn have moved to Ashlyn's abandoned family farm in the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia, the breadbasket of the Confederacy. Seamus' faith is shaken due to some disasters and feels like a failure.

Youngest brother Davin struck it rich in California, but at what personal cost?

I loved this book. The characters are well drawn and complex. Mr. Reynolds' research helped me to understand another layer of the Civil War. For instance, I was unaware of the exploitation of the Irish--they were given a flag and placed on the front lines. He also explored the reality of good and bad people on both sides of the Mason Dixon line.

This is Christian fiction that anyone could read and enjoy. It would also be a great "stand alone".
For more about Michael K. Reynolds and this book, please read the following information!

This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

Songs of the Shenandoah

B&H Books (January 1, 2014)


by

Michael Reynolds


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Michael K. Reynolds is a writer with more than two decades of experience in crafting fiction, non-fiction, journalism, copywriting and documentary production. He is the author of a series of Irish historical novels published by B&H Publishing Group. These highly acclaimed books are available in bookstores and libraries across the nation and beyond.

Michael is the writer and producer of an Emmy and Telly award-winning series of documentaries titled, Crystal Darkness. These thirty minute anti-meth films have been heavily promoted and broadcast in cities and states throughout the United States and Mexico. They have been viewed collectedly by more than 10 million people and the message has reached more than 30 million to date.

He also has wide experience as a speaker and on-air personality and has been interviewed on a variety of newspapers, radio stations and televisions networks throughout the nation.

Michael earned his B.A. in Creative Writing from the University of California, San Diego and lives in Reno with his wife and three children. He is active in marketplace, marriage, small group and men’s ministries as a leader and speaker.


ABOUT THE BOOK

At the onset of the Civil War, Seamus heeds his wife’s wishes to return to her beloved family farm in the South, where he takes a post as chaplain for General Stonewall Jackson’s brigade. As Seamus ministers to the troops, his sister Clare ministers in a different way—by being a powerful voice in the Northern cause toward freeing the slaves. All this while their youngest brother Davin, who became wealthy during the Gold Rush, struggles to find love and identity in a fallen world. It’s a clash of loyalties and beliefs that threaten the entire family, each of them trying to hear God’s encouragement in the midst of the tragedy of war. The dramatic conclusion to the acclaimed Heirs of Ireland Series.



If you would like to read the first chapter of Songs of the Shenandoah, go HERE.

Tempest's Course by Lynette Sowell

Tempest's Course by Lynette Sowell is the reason I love fiction. It's the kind of "bring it on" story that has everything (and I don't think I'm exaggerating here) that I love in a good, cozy, curl up in my chair with my tea kind of book.

Heroine Kelly Frost ended up in the foster care system, abused and adrift, until kindhearted Lottie and her husband Chuck take her into their already overflowing foster home, where Kelly shares Lottie's interest in textiles and sewing. Now grown up, Kelly has made a name for herself as a textile conservator for some well known museums in New England. Her career was on the rise until she was betrayed by someone she loved, leaving her not quite on the verge of ruin, but definitely set back and in need of a job.

She is hired by a mysterious foundation to restore an antique Mariner's Compass quilt in an old sea captain's mansion which hasn't been lived in in about 70 years. There is a handsome but damaged caretaker, named Tom, a lawyer named Chandler, and an old man named Mr.Plummer.

When Kelly finds the journal of Mary Gray, the sea captain's unhappy wife, she realizes that they have similar stories, except that Kelly's is still a work in progress.

Tempest's Course is about new beginnings and making better choices. That it's okay to learn from the past and that the people that have gone before still have much to teach--if we have eyes to see and a mustard seed's worth of faith to hang on to. And maybe, with the restorative power of love, the Mariner's Compass will lead her back to a place she can call home.

This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

Tempest's Course

Abingdon Press (December 17, 2013)


by

Lynette Sowell


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Lynette Sowell is an award-winning novelist. Her most recent novel, Tempest’s Course, is part of the Quilts of Love line from Abingdon Press. When Lynette’s not writing, she divides her time between editing medical reports and chasing down news stories for the Copperas Cove Leader-Press. Lynette was born and raised on the Eastern Shore of Maryland but makes her home in Coppress Cove, Texas, with her husband and a herd of cats who have them well-trained.



ABOUT THE BOOK

Kelly Frost, a textiles conservator, is invited to the Massachusetts coastal city of New Bedford to restore a 150-year-old Mariner's Compass quilt. But there is one stipulation: she must live and work in Gray House, a former whaling captain's home, where the quilt is stored. There she meets Army veteran Tom Pereira, the caretaker of Gray House, whose heart seems as hard as the rocky Massachusetts coastline. Over the long-lit months as Kelly works to restore the quilt, she and Tom grow closer. And as she reads stories in a daily journal penned by Mary Gray, she learns the secrets of the quilt and Mary's own sad tale of regret. Then Tom learns secrets of his own family's past, and both Tom and Kelly learn they are tied to Gray House in ways they never imagined.


If you would like to read the first chapter of Tempest's Course, go HERE.

Merry Humbug Christmas by Sandra D. Bricker

With Merry Humbug Christmas you get Two Tales of Holiday Romance for the price of one!
I am swirling the ice in my dairy free eggnog as I ponder the simple genius of it all.

In Once Upon a Jingle Bell we meet friends Joss Snow and Reese Prendergrass. They usually spend Christmas together--not celebrating. They both have their reasons for avoiding the holiday-- good ones-- but this year is different. Reese receives a marriage proposal which she joyfully accepts-- along with an invitation to her fiance's family lodge on Sugarloaf Mountain. So Joss takes matters into her own hands and books a "Bah Humbug" cruise to Mexican ports of call until the whole fa la la holiday is over... of course things go wonderfully awry, romance ensues, and new friends help heal old wounds.

In It Came Upon a Midnight Deer, Reese's visit to the future in-laws is not exactly a trip to Candy Land unless the destination is the licorice swamp... Fiance Damian Palmer's family is loud and energetic, with traditions galore, but Reece gets off on the wrong foot on more than one occasion, which leaves her with some yuletide concerns. Note: I think we'd all like to give being the Palmers a try...

Well, all I have to say is, the folks at B&H Books and author Sandra Bricker really know how to bless the hopeless Christmas romantic. I urge all you Lifetime Christmas addicts to put down the remote and pick up Merry Humbug Christmas. Okay, record the Lifetime movies, then get cozy and settle in for a long winter's read!

More information about Sandra Bricker and Merry Humbug Christmas please continue:

This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

Merry Humbug Christmas

B&H Books (October 15, 2013)

by

Sandra D. Bricker


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

For more than a decade, Sandra D. Bricker lived in Los Angeles. While honing her chosen craft of screenwriting in every spare moment, she worked as a personal assistant and publicist to some of daytime television's hottest stars. When her mother became ill in Florida, she walked away from that segment of her life and moved across the country to take on a new role: Caregiver.

The author says that it was her 8th novel that opened the door to finding her way as a writer. "I'm a Christian woman, first and foremost," she says. "So it was a bit of a dream-come-true when Summerside Press chose me as one of two authors to launch the Love Finds You line."


Sandie's real-life role as cancer survivor has parlayed into her steadfast commitment to raising awareness and funds for ovarian cancer research. Spearheading a series of devotionals for Summerside Press (such as the popular His Grace is Sufficient...Decaf is Not), the author has stipulated that a portion of each contributor's proceeds will go to the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund.


   
"Being allowed to combine my faith and my humor with raising funds for my pet projects ... and still pursue my writing dream," says Bricker, "well, that's the best of all worlds, as far as I'm concerned!"


And one of the author's pet projects is animal rescue, evidenced by the special bond she has created with one particular formerly-abandoned puppy -- a red-haired collie with "killer brown eyes and the heart of the class clown."

 

ABOUT THE BOOK

A Merry Humbug Christmas features two holiday romance novellas from hilarious and heartwarming author Sandra D. Bricker. -- the perfect gift to yourself or someone else at this most wonderfully stressful time of year.

 In "Once Upon a Jingle Bell," A Bah! Humbug cruise to the Mexican Riviera is Joss Snow’s answer to this year’s quest to avoid the holidays completely; at least until she’s rebooked on a different kind of cruise altogether. Candy canes, holly wreaths, reindeer and ornaments seem to be stalking her on the 12 Days of Christmas holiday cruise extravaganza. An escape back to land is her only goal . . . until she meets a kindred spirit in rugged Irishman Patrick Brenneman, and then the game is on! Avoid Christmas festivities at all costs . . . except maybe for that one stop under the mistletoe.

In "It Came Upon a Midnight Deer," Reese’s guilt over abandoning best friend Joss on their holiday tradition of avoiding all things Christmas is trumped by the joy of her recent engagement. Meeting Damian’s family for the first time on idyllic Sugarloaf Mountain is about as far from that Bah! Humbug cruise as she can get, and Reese can hardly wait to get there. But from the moment they hit that deer in the road just two miles from the cabin, everything seems to go wrong. There are no drummers drumming or pipers piping this particular year! And once she sets her future in-laws’ family cabin ablaze, she’s pretty sure there won’t be even ONE golden ring in her future.



If you would like to read the first chapter of Merry Humbug Christmas, go HERE.

Aloha Rose by Lisa Carter

Aloha Rose is part of the Quilts of Love series by Abbingdon Fiction. This one is a contemporary romance which follows a young woman's search for her birth family, taking her to the beautiful Hawaiian Islands.

Laney Carrigan  suffers from abandonment and trust issues. She was adopted by a loving couple after her birth mother left her on their doorstep, but since her adoptive mother's death and father's remarriage, she's feeling like a ship that has lost its mooring. It is time for her to search for her "roots".

Kai Barnes, Laney's love interest, is a complicated hero who suffers from post traumatic stress syndrome, and fears loving almost as much as Laney fears trusting. 

I really enjoyed this foray into Hawaiian culture.  I have long admired the Hawaiian tradition of quilting involving gorgeous applique and liked how the "Aloha Rose" quilt was used in the story to help Laney find her family. The symbolism was really special! 

Please read on for more information about Aloha Rose and author Lisa Carter!

This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

Aloha Rose

Abingdon Press (November 19, 2013)

by

Lisa Carter

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: 

A word from the author:

I am a wife and mother. My husband and I have two daughters and make our home in the beautiful state of North Carolina.

I am a teacher. With a Master’s degree in history, I have taught at the university, high school and middle school levels. After years of church involvement as a soloist, choir member and worship leader, I also teach music.

I am a writer. Delighted by the rhythm and musicality of words, I have been writing since childhood. In 2001, I won the Mothers of Preschoolers (MOPS) Story Writing Contest that re-ignited a lifelong love of writing.

I am on a journey of faith. My ultimate desire through my life and my writing is to proclaim the truth of God’s Word, His redeeming love as seen in the life of Jesus Christ and to help others know for themselves this great, awesome God of all comfort and wisdom. He is enough for every need.

ABOUT THE BOOK

When Laney Carrigan sets out to find her birth family, her only clue is the Hawaiian quilt—a red rose snowflake appliquéd on a white background—in which she was found wrapped as an infant. Centering her search on the Big Island and battling fears of rejection, Laney begins a painstaking journey toward her true heritage. Kai Barnes, however, is determined to protect the people he’s come to regard as family. He thinks Laney is nothing more than a gold digger and blocks every move she makes toward her Hawaiian family. As their conflict escalates, it puts at risk the one thing that Kai and Laney both want most—a family.

If you would like to read the first chapter of Aloha Rose, go HERE.

Critical Reaction by Todd M. Johnson

If you like nail-biting legal suspense novels you will love Critical Reaction by Todd M. Johnson. Mr. Johnson is an expert in the legal field, and in the tradition of John Grisham, crafts his novels with details that require a vast knowledge of the law, and a rip-roaring good story to keep you turning the pages.

There is a nuclear explosion. A cover-up. A young attorney named Emily Hart takes the case to help her friend, Kieran, from college.  She needs assistance and turns to Ryan, her father, an experienced trial lawyer. But they haven't been close since her mother's cancer diagnosis and subsequent death.  Ryan sees this as an opportunity to build a bridge back into Emily's life even though Kieran's case seems to be hopeless.

As with all things that are bad in this world, dark forces are at work, and the deeper you go-- like a wound that gets infected-- the uglier things become.

I applaud Todd Johnson for using his expertise and talent to shine the light on "the evil that men do" but shows, through his characters, that courage and faith can prevail-- even when all hope is lost.

I would love for everyone to read Critical Reaction.

Please check out the following information provided by the publisher, Bethany House--one of the best!

This week, the

Christian Fiction Blog Alliance

is introducing

Critical Reaction

Bethany House Publishers (November 19, 2013)

by

Todd M. Johnson


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Todd M. Johnson has practiced as an attorney for over 30 years, specializing as a trial lawyer. Todd's career experience blends with his passion for writing in his novels published through Bethany House.


A graduate of Princeton University and the University of Minnesota Law School, he also taught for two years as an adjunct professor of International Law, and served as a US diplomat in Hong Kong.


The Deposit Slip, Mr. Johnson's first novel, debuted in 2012.  Todd's second novel, Critical Reaction, will be released in November 2013.


Todd lives outside Minneapolis, Minnesota, with his wife Cathy and children Ian and Libby.



ABOUT THE BOOK

After decades of turning out plutonium for the arms race, the Hanford Nuclear Facility has long been shuttered, though its deadly legacy cannot be fully contained. The men who guard the facility from sabotage or monitor its buildings for radiation leaks are told the risks are under control. They believe it, until the worst happens: a thunderous explosion in the dead of night.


Two workers, lifer Poppy Martin and new hire Kieran Mullaney, believe themselves lucky to survive the blast. But as the debris is cleared, they discover their safety is not assured. Dead ends and closed doors halt their efforts to discover what really happened--and what radiation may have poisoned them. When stalling and threats force them into the hands of experienced trial lawyer Ryan Hart, they learn that theirs is no ordinary lawsuit. There is something still hidden in the desert of eastern Washington, and someone is willing to go to extreme lengths to make sure it never sees the light of day.


If you would like to read the first chapter of Critical Reaction, go HERE.