David and Goliath by Bryan Hathaway

If you read the blurb from the back cover of this book (or customer reviews on sites like Amazon.com), you will get all the basic details of the story line of this very well written book. However, this book is not really about the details of David’s life. It’s an allegory for the fight for our souls between God and Satan. All of the characters in this book, from David (our main character) to Joshua, Emmett and even Mary represent blessings and challenges we all face each day in our lives. The author, Bryan Hathaway writes an amazing story with characters who show us this struggle without preaching it to us. The verbal painting is so wonderfully accomplished we don’t even realize we are getting the message.


To see these similarities written so effortlessly reminded me of times in my own life. Hathaway’s storytelling reminds me of Frank Peretti who is one of my favorite authors. I can’t wait to read the next book in this series- The Guardian Angel Chronicles.

Having said all that, the story draws you in to David’s struggle to fulfill the his side of the deal and we see the transformation he makes as he learns to trust God and love others. Truly one of my new favorites!

*This book was provided free of charge by Glass Road Public Relations for my honest and individual review. *

Unwilling Warrior by Andrea Boeshaar

Although not one of my favorite era’s to read about, Unwilling Warrior by Andrea Boeshaar is set in the Civil War time period of the United States and is very well written. The main Character, Valerie, having lost her mother returns home only to find her father angry at her for leaving the relative safety of the school for young women she is attending. Valerie discovers that her father is involved in activities that make it dangerous for her to be home and is sets in motion her flight to safety.


While home, Valerie meets her father’s house guest, Ben McCabe. Ben is a photographer who is trying to capture the heart of the war and now is committed to searching for his brother who has gone missing since the battle of Bull Run. What neither of them suspects is the long road they must each travel in distance and understanding before they can be together.

There are many facets of this book, and not all of them are the main story line. It reads like real life as you see glimpses of others around the main characters and how they impact their journey. Altogether a great read!

*This book was provided free of charge by Glass Road Public Relations for my honest and individual review. *

Morning for Dove by Martha Rogers Book Review

This would be a great book for a young adult to read.  It is a love story, but so much more than that.  I love that the main characters, who are young adults, show respect and kindness to others in their daily lives.  They learn some tough lessons about forgiveness, love and loyalty.  Dove, our heroine has a native American heritage and faces a tough time with people who can't accept her for who she is rather than her race.  Luke, who wants to be with Dove, has to understand and overcome the disapproval of his Mother and still behave with respect.  Add in greedy neighbors who want to steal land and will stop at nothing to get it, and there are many facets to this story.  Dove and Luke along with their good friends Martin and Sarah mature in their Faith as well as discover that healing is possible even for Luke's Mother. 
This is a well written story that shows a glimpse of early American living.  It combines a love story, a struggle to protect a town and families from a dangerous neighbor, and shows that love and forgiveness can heal even life's toughest wounds.

Child Custody-  getting messy.  We have been working on getting custody of the boys for a year and 7 months and have yet to set foot in the court room.  It's getting hard to keep the peace with their Mother and still try to do the things for them that need to be done.  Like homework.  When we have the boys on Wednesday nights, or on our weekend, the oldest one has to spend hours working on over due homework because their Mother won't make them do it.  The last weekend the were here the oldest had 6 math assignments that were past due.  We can make him do them and turn them in, but he only gets a 60% on them once they are so late.  also since he is missing so much class for ISS he isn't getting to hear the lecture on how to do the assignments, so for this really smart kid who is great in math he is having trouble that is unnecessary.   She lets him play his nintendo DS, play the Wii they got for Christmas even when he gets suspended.  He's gonna fail this grade for no good reason.  When he is with us, we help him with his homework when he gets stuck and just in general make sure he's working on it, but otherwise, it's so easy for him.  He's failing simply because he isn't in class and not required to do his homework by his mother on a daily basis.   what is wrong with her????   And if he fails- next year he is going to be so bored because he won't be challenged and it will be that much harder to make him pay attention.  He says he can't concentrate in school and so she raised the dose on his ADHD medicine, but wouldn't ya know it, His brother's say he is up till 1 or 2 am playing video games or watching tv (he admits this).  He doesn't need to be drugged, he needs a bedtime!!!!!! I would think that would be the obvious solution instead of paying money to drug a child with medicines that have serious psychological  side effects, like hallucinations to name a scary one. 

God please watch over these boys and help us always do the best we can for them based on what is best for them.  We need your help and strength so much to get through this.

Mother's Day

I had a wonderful day yesterday for my first Mother's Day.  I spent the day with my husband, my baby girl and our family.  What a wonderful day! We went out to eat and then spent time with the family.  What a day!   I also woke up to beautiful Mother's Day cards from my boys!  They are amazing kids. 

Book Reviews!!

I am so amazingly thrilled.   To support my reading addiction, years ago I discovered the amazing resource called a library.   I used to spend every available (and sometimes not so available) dollar I had on books.   Once I realized how bad this was getting, I went to the library.  Thank God (really) this was an option.   However, being unemployeed now, I can't afford the $50 annual fee for the local large county library.  I'm going crazy, I need to read something I haven't already read 10 times from my own book shelves! 

I have found a way to read, tell my friends about the books and not spend the morgtage money!!  Life is awesome!