All is Bright

Thomas Kinkade's Cape Light: All is Bright by Katherine Spencer
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

At number 15, the Cape Light series is still going strong. In this book, Reverend Ben is doing some reminiscing of days gone by...when he first started preaching at his new church and his daughter Rachel was just a baby. Rachel, now 36 and widowed at 34, is still putting one foot in front of the other, trying to protect her two children from the effects of losing their father. Will she be able to remove the walls she built around them when possible love and hope are peeking in?

These sweet novels remind us of home, faith in humanity and God, and that there is always hope....

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The Christmas Light

The Christmas Light by Donna VanLiere
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I look forward to reading Donna VanLiere's Christmas novella each year as we ready ourselves for the holiday/holy days soon approaching. This year's writing focuses on several hurting families in the town of Grandon, who are trying to get back on track and somehow enjoy Christmas. Jennifer De Luca is struggling to uncover the darkness for her six-year-old daughter Avery. Ryan Mazyck and his young daughter, Sophia, are moving for work reasons and are thinking of settling near his Aunt Gloria in Grandon. Sixteen-year-old Kaylee wants to believe that everything will be ok, but right now she can't see it beyond her expanding tummy. Stephen and Lily love their little church, Grandon Community, and are helping prepare for the Christmas Nativity. Each family is brought together by the power of love and faith.

There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.

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The Why of Things

The Why of Things: A Novel by Elizabeth Hartley Winthrop
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Winthrop pens a well written fictional story of a daughter's suicide and her family's loss, grief, and return to hope centered around their summer home and a nearby deep, dark quarry. Like the quarry, a gaping hole has been left in the Jacobs' family and each member has their own way of dealing with the heart-wrenching aftermath and the sometimes non-answer of why bad things happen.

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The Cottage at Glass Beach

The Cottage At Glass Beach by Heather Barbieri
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Nora Cunningham is taking refuge on Burke's Island, a small remote strip of land off the Maine coast and settled by the Irish centuries before. Her famous husband and his affair have been splashed over tabloids so Nora and her two girls, Annie, 7 and Ella, 12 going on 21 are hiding out. Nora's earliest memories are of Burke's, being able to swim like a fish, and her beautiful mother that disappeared when she was only small. Nora's elderly Aunt Maire lives in the old homeplace nearby and who summoned her with a letter still believes in the magical legends of the island including selkies - a mythical creature. As the island begins to heal Nora, she is drawn towards a quiet fisherman who guards his own secrets but Ella blames her parent's breakup only on her mother, causing her to say and do things that put her and her sister into danger.

Beautifully written and full of mystery, The Cottage at Glass Beach, makes a good anytime read.

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A Gift of Hope by Danielle Steel
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Danielle Steel writes about her secret plight to help the homeless in San Francisco, taken up after her son, Nick, committed suicide. She writes with an honest, respectful look at the troubled men and women that she and her team Yo! Angel! have come across. It all started out with one outing, a stack of sleeping bags, down jackets, and some wool socks and gloves and grew from that. This book is a call for help...

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The Christmas Shoppe

The Christmas Shoppe by Melody Carlson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Poor Matilda Honeycutt - from the moment she enters town, people are talking about her, forming their own opinions on the woman who bought the old Barton building in the small town of Parrish Springs. As the news leaks out that the store will be named The Christmas Shoppe, the town becomes excited, but the balloon is burst when customers finally enter through the front door and see the dilapidated goods. However, this store is full of sweet and wonderful surprises!



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One Summer

One Summer by David Baldacci

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


David Baldacci does a 180 and writes the story of the Armstrong family - Jack, who is dying of a rare form of cancer and only wants to live through Christmas, his devoted wife Lizzie, who is caring for him at home, teenage daughter Mikki, who can't deal with Jack's illness, 12 year old son Cory, and Jack Jr. - still a toddler and unaware of his dad's impending death. As Jack's body continues to weaken, Christmas Eve arrives - but with more tragedy. Lizzie, on a last minute trip in her van to the pharmacy for Jack's meds, is hit and killed when she runs a red light - broadsided by a snowplow. In despair, Jack prepares to die and allows Bonnie, Lizzie's mom, to take his three children and farm them out to different family members. Alone in a hospice unit all Jack has left is his memories, but then the unthinkable happens - a miracle for Jack. He begins to slowly regain his strength. Although the doctors advise Jack that it's just temporary - no one recovers from the unnamed illness - Jack struggles to recover his life and begins by reclaiming his children and moving back to the beloved childhood home of Lizzie's on the ocean.


Labeled sappy by some readers, One Summer is still a good read - an emotional roller coaster and you will cheer for Jack, a veteran of Afghanistan an Iraq. Fans of Nicholas Sparks and Richard Paul Evans will enjoy this novel. Devoted, die hard fans of his Camel Club mystery thrillers may not be so thrilled....



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The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


My first read of Sherman Alexie's novels - and a pick for One Maryland, One Book for 2011 is a 100% uplifting read about 14 year old Junior, who lives on the bleak Spokane rez with his alcoholic parents and an older sister who never leaves the basement. Junior, because of his size and health problems, against all odds, somehow still maintains hope and this hope spurns him on to leave his own school to attend an all white high school inconveniently located 22 miles away in a farming community. Junior's "friends" on the rez, shun and bully him even further for leaving, and even his best main man, Rowdy, is out to maim him on the basketball court.

". . . I realized that, sure, Indians were drunk and sad and displaced and crazy and mean, but dang, we knew how to laugh. When it comes to death, we know that laughter and tears are pretty much the same thing."

Although terrible, tragic situations arise, Alexie gets his point across with a sense of humor and hilarious cartoons. Reading it after me is my 15 year old son, who was surprised by how much he enjoyed it. Don't let the blunt language and the real thoughts of a teen boy put you off - this book is a definite winner.

To deepen your reading and knowledge of Sherman Alexie, look more into his background and see the correlation between his life and his novels.



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The Wishing Trees

The Wishing Trees by John Shors

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


A lovely, moving book about a father and daughter who are struggling at moving on after the death of the woman they both love. Years ago an Australian boy, Ian falls in love with an American girl, Kate, while working in Japan. Tramping around Asia, the couple decide to marry and move back to America, where they produce a daughter, Mattie, who has her mother's artistic skills. As Ian and Kate's 15th anniversary draws nearer, they plan another romp around Asia, but cancer interrupts their plans. However, 10 months after Kate's death, Ian opens a box, with a letter from Kate imploring him to continue with the trip to Asia in hopes that he and Mattie will learn to be happy and laugh again. Needed: plenty of tissues.



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