Cats in Paris by Won-Sun Jang

This adult coloring book does have the flavor of Paris from it's charming cover to the "bonjour"back cover!  Inside you will find delightful kitties of all types.  Explore historical places with these cats.  Also visit cats lounging on cushions, wandering through butterfly gardens and surveying their domain atop a pile of suitcases.  Other cats proudly peruse book stores or bags of cat food.  You'll find cats on stamps, listed by types, playing with yarn, snuggling in a basket, wearing champion ribbons and leaving paw prints on the pages.  This book is perfect for a cat lover or lover of Paris or French culture.

I receive this book free from the publishers in exchange for my honest review.

Whatever is Lovely (A Coloring Book for Reflection and Worship) by Waterbrook Press

As adult coloring books become the rage, Whatever is Lovely, comes as a fresh breath of air.  This truly is a worship book.  The drawings are intricate in detail yet simple enough to be enjoyable to color.  Each page has a focus verse with designs to compliment the message.  On the reverse side of the coloring page is the full verse, whether scripture, a book reference or quote.  These words are inspirational, comforting, soothing, thought-provoking and wise.  There is variety in the types of pictures to color.  The pages are thick and not see through.  This makes them suitable for crayons, colored pencils or markers.  This is a high quality adult coloring book to be shared happily with others.

The Mountain Midwife by Laurie Alice Eakes

This book is truly uncommonly good!  It's a marvelous read about historic midwifery and a modern midwife.  I could not put this book down.  I instantly liked Ashley and felt drawn into her relationship with her patients.  This book is a good blend of intrigue/mystery, spiritual advice woven into the dialogue between characters and tender romance.  I was impressed with how the author was able to get across some very deep spiritual truths but in a natural way not contrived.  This is how Christian story telling should be done!  Pick up this book and take a little trip into the Appalachian mountains and learn not only a bit about the culture there but a lot about love, forgiveness and how being perfect is highly overrated when God's grace appears.

The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning

If you don't believe in being saved 100% by grace hold on to your hats.  Maybe this book isn't for you but then again I think this book is exactly for you!  Manning has a sharp, no-nonsense approach to the most wonderful news of all.  God loves you exactly as you are.  You don't have to do a thing to earn His love or favor.  He has given all to save you and He is pursuing you with his "furious love" as Manning so artfully phrases it.  In the pages of this book you will meet a God who is far different from what a lot of us have grown up with.  This God wants to save you.  This God wants to make you whole.  This God offers a forgiveness that transforms us for our own sake not to make us worthy of His love.  Please take note of that last point.  His forgiveness transforms you...You will not remain the same.  This God's love is bigger than anything you could ever imagine.  This God's love is enough.  Period.  End of story.

The Girl From The Train by Irma Joubert

An addictive tale of the healing power of thankfulness and love told through the eyes of a young girl who lost everything and yet gained all.  The story starts on a train bound for a concentration camp and ends up with the heroine in South Africa.  Without spoiling the story I can say that Gretchen’s path is not the expected one.  You will be surprised, delighted, in anguish, crushed with grief and buoyed by hope, disgusted by prejudice, humbled by forgiveness and astonished at the leaps of faith and raw power that surges through a soul in love.  You won’t want to miss this book!

I received this book free from the publishers and was not required to write a positive review.

A Refuge at Highland Hall by Carrie Turansky

An enlightening historical novel of WWI that focuses on those without a family.  It deals with estranged families, orphan and abandoned children, and those who don't feel as if they have a place to call home.  Highland Hall becomes a refuge in more than one way as the Ramseys and Fosters open their home and hearts to an interesting and varied group of lost souls from an injured pilot, a German internment victim, and servants that become family.  The healing that takes place at Highland Hall is much more than physical.  Breaches are crossed and healed.  New opportunities and dreams are realized through the faith each holds in God and in each other's potential and worth.  This books is an inspirational story of the intricacies of God's merciful plans for our good.

I received this book free from the publishers and was not required to write a positive review.

A Reason To Stay by Kellie Coates Gilbert

An interesting take on opposites attract!  The woman is a career aspiring journalist become anchor woman.  The man is a country boy who deep sea fishes in competitions.  But there's a lot more to the story than this.  Ideals of family, home, marriage contrast sharply for the characters of this book.  You'll read and learn about the news world and bass fishing competitions.  You will also be drawn into a love story that isn't a fairy tale at all but has some hard, often painful lessons in the day to day struggle of two people juggling their emotions, pasts and present day dramas.  This is a book that often had me on the edge of my seat and chewing my fingernails!  It brought me to tears with the real life heartache that can keep people from accepting and giving love.  But the book triumphs in the love of God to heal those who accept His balm for their souls.