A Whisper of Peace by Kim Vogel Sawyer

Wow! Kim Vogel Sawyer has done it again. She has woven a beautiful story encompassing the wonder of God’s Love and an intriguing historical setting. This book takes place in Alaska among the native people there. Clay Selby and his sister, Vivian, go as missionaries to a native tribe and meet Lizzie, a woman with a native mother and a Caucasian father. Their struggles to reach the people in the tribe and Lizzie’s struggle to belong in her mother’s world, along with Vivian’s struggle to reconcile her past all make for an interesting story. This is another one of those books you can’t put down until you have savored the last word. The sweetest part of it is the acceptance of the Father (God) by the people in the story and the firm reliance they put on His care.

Much rich detail in contained in this book and obviously Ms. Sawyer did a lot of research. I love the setting of this story and I love the fact that it is about missionaries. The missionaries of the past and the missionaries of the present are my personal heroes. The wonderful way Ms. Sawyer tells the story of their faith and reliance on God makes it obvious that she has a deep personal relationship with the Father. So many books of Christian fiction just do lip service to God and personal relationship with Him, almost an afterthought added in to make it “Christian.” Not so, here. I was so blessed by this book. It renewed my zeal to see others given an opportunity to embrace His salvation. Thank you Bethany House for giving me this book to review. And thank you Ms. Sawyer for another wonderful book to read. I am waiting in great anticipation for the next one to be published.

A Most Unsuitable Match by Stephanie Grace Whitson

A Most Unsuitable Match
By Stephanie Grace Whitson

This book had some surprises. It was interesting to learn about the boats going to the Montana goldfields and the reality of the harsh life once one arrived there. The heroine was somewhat daring but a LOT naïve. All the characters in this book were interesting in their own right.

The story is about Fannie who after the death of her parents discovers she has an aunt she hasn’t met. Disillusioned by the state of affairs she finds herself in and the poor management of her financial advisor, she takes off to find her aunt. The people she meets along the way and her aunt, when she finds her, help shape her life and turn it in an entirely unexpected direction.

The author left out some details at the end that would have helped resolve some of the conflict in the story, so one is left wondering if a sequel will ensue in which we will learn more of those details.
All in all, this was a very delightful book and I am grateful for Bethany House giving me the opportunity to review this book and discover Stephanie Grace Whitson who will join my list of preferred authors.

Interview with Mike Halpin of Haptoon

The Old Schoolhouse magazine is having a Blog Hop. Here is their blog: http://blog.thehomeschoolmagazine.com/ . Each participant was assigned someone to interview. I got my first choice, Mike Halpin of Haptoons. Here is that interview!

1) How did you first begin combining art with a spiritual message?

When Jesus saved me back in 1971.

I left my hometown of Detroit, Michigan soon after I graduated High School and moved to Berkley, California to pursue a career in underground cartooning. (All the major underground companies were located in the Bay area.)

By God’s grace, I was not successful and because of my excessive hedonistic lifestyle, hit rock bottom.

Thanks be to God the Rock was Jesus. He save me and turned my life around to serve Him. I automatically began to express my newfound faith through the media of cartooning.

In 2001, I was involved in a creativity group at Calvary Chapel. One of the assignments was to take a little sermonette and do something creative with it. I wrote a poem and did the following cartoon:





At the same time, my niece’s husband, Justin Kaake, created the Haptoon website and “The Seven Truths of John 3:16” was the first cartoon. Since then I have created over 200 Haptoons. (Unfortunately the website crashed and I hope to start a new website soon.)

2) What do you hope families receive through your Haptoons?

Haptoon is a personal reflection of what I am learning as I seek to know God through His Word. It is also a calling to proclaim the Gospel. I echo the Apostle Paul’s conviction “Woe to me if I do not cartoon for the Lord!” (1 Cor. 9:16)

I pray as one reads my cartoons, God’s Word will minister to them. I try to include scripture references and hope they will dig into God’s Word for themselves.

Finally, I hope my Haptoons will encourage us all to “fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith.” (Heb. 12:2)
My greatest joy is when I receive e-mail from parents who are using Haptoon to teach their children God’s Word. It doesn’t get much better than that.

If you would like to personally receive Haptoon, please e-mail me at haptoon@juno.com and I will add you to my list.

Thanks and God bless.

Horse Dreams (Backyard Horses Series) by Dandi Daley Mackall

This is the first book in a new series by Dandi Daley Mackall called Backyard Horses. If you have an elementary school-aged girl that is enamored with horses, as many of them are, this would be an excellent series to gift her with. This is a paperback of approximately 150 pages.

The story is about 10-year-old Ellie who has asked God daily for several years for a beautiful black stallion. When a rather down and out pinto unexpectedly comes into her life, she takes a great interest in the horse but doesn’t realize for a while that she has finally received God’s answer to her prayers. If I tell you any more of the story, I will spoil it for you so I will leave it for you to read. The book is very engaging. Both my granddaughter and I read it in one sitting.

Tyndale gave me this book to review and I look forward to reading the rest of the series as it comes out. This particular volume has a bonus of the sign language alphabet (Ellie’s young brother is deaf) and a “Horse Talk” glossary.

Pattern of Wounds: A Roland March Mystery by J. Mark Bertrand

This is a crime mystery that is hard to put down. This is not my normal genre of leisure reading material, but something about the description intrigued me when it appeared on a list of books to review for Bethany House.

This is a fast paced story with a surprise around every corner and lots of loose ends that get tied up eventually in the course of the story. It is about a detective searching for a killer with a distinctive M.O. amidst department politics, marital situation, internal conflicts, old family history and spiritual uncertainty. It all manages to come together pretty well with a few questions left unanswered for a starting point for the next book in the series.

I enjoyed this book and look forward to reading more in this series in the future.

FREE!

I thought you might be interested in the free summer digital issue of The Old Schoolhouse Magazine. Feel free to forward to those you know that might have interest as this is a free for all. :+)



http://www.thehomeschoolmagazine-digital.com/thehomeschoolmagazine/freegift#pg2

Inside Threat by Jason Elam and Steve Yohn

This book was one of those books that you didn't want to put down for anything -- just read it from beginning to end in one sitting. I wasn't able to do that but could think of little else when I didn't have it in my hands.

This is the story of a very realistic and very plausible terrorist attack on US soil by US-born Islamic terrorists. It is told from the point of view of various members of a special ops team in Washington, DC and also from the point of view of one of the terrorists.

Not only will you gain a greater understanding of some of today's most important issues, you will also find the plot of this story very instructional.

One of the agents involved is Khadi Faroughi,a Muslim-born woman who is caught in the middle of the attack and held hostage. Khadi does much soul searching during her ordeal, praying to Allah and to God and trying to gain a peace about which one she would serve. This is all done very tastefully with no preaching involved. You just live through the things going on in her life with her.

I would never have picked this book up off the shelf but when Tyndale offered it to me for review, it looked intriguing so I requested it. I am so glad I did. This is one of the best books I have read this year! Now I need to search out a copy of a previous book that this one is a sequel to. I highly recommend this book to you no matter what genre you are most accustomed to. You will be glad you read this book.