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Tandem Cottage by Carrie Fancett Pagels

May4

So Beautiful

Tandem Cottage by Carrie Fancett Pagels is a most charming contemporary Christian novel that I adored. It is the third book in the Mackinac Cottages series but can be read as a stand-alone.

Carrie Fancett Pagels always writes fabulous stories that are close to the heart of God. We see that life can be hard but God is always good and God is always faithful. We can lean on Him and trust Him through all the seasons of life. “She might not be able, but God was.”

God gives us opportunities. “There are no coincidences just God incidents.” Nothing in life surprises God. Whatever we are going through, He is already there. He provides instances where we can lean on Him and trust His leading. When life is hard and makes no sense, press into God, recognise His hand on our lives. “Choices… God was providing.” God provides choices to help us. We can choose whether to accept or not.

We learn about the importance of music. “Good praise music…that’s something that helps get me through… life.” Music can lift us above our circumstances and draw us close to the heart of God.

Within the tale, a character is suffering from grief. “Grief… You could be laughing one moment and crying the next.” Grief brings a mixture of emotions. Guilt and grief go hand in hand. God wants us to live free. He wants to take our grief and guilt and pain, and exchange them for His care and love. “None of us is perfect. But God extends grace.” Grace. We don’t deserve it. We cannot earn it. Grace is a gift from God, paid in full by the blood of Jesus on the cross.

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The Girl Who Dared To Dream by Diney Costeloe

May3

Going Against The Grain

The Girl Who Dared To Dream by Diney Costeloe is a marvellous historical novel and the first book in a fabulous new series entitled Girls Who Dared. I cannot wait for subsequent books.

The setting is London in 1912. The world is teetering on the edge between the old and new order. Girls have always been seen as the weaker sex but leading lady, Mabel Oakley is all set to prove her critics wrong! She knows her own mind and is able to break out of the traditional mould, not being afraid to speak up. She has her dreams too.

We see that in order to beat the system; one has to stand against it. Nothing will stand in Mabel Oakley’s way of her desire to have more education than was usual for a girl – until one fateful day when dreams must be laid aside.

The upper classes still flaunt their wealth and their opinions. The reader glimpses a life below stairs where not only do the upper classes rule, but the servants have a pecking order too. We witness the awful conditions for the young female servants, who are taken advantage of.

There is no welfare state. Following an accident to the breadwinner, all family members must get a job including the youngest, a thirteen-year-old boy.

There may not be much money, but there is a lot of love.

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Being Dorothy: In A World Longing For Home by Michele Olson

May1

Coming Home

Being Dorothy: In A World Longing For Home by Michele Olson is a most delightful Christian tale. It is the second book in the Mackinac Island Stories but can be read as a stand-alone. I would recommend reading book one first for character continuity and progression.

Once more, the reader journeys to the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island. The year is 1980 and there are references to the filming of the movie Somewhere In Time in 1979 (one of my favourite movies of all time), which was the focus of book one. We meet Piper and Cam, the leading characters in the first book.

In Being Dorothy, the focus is on another couple, Gideon and Dorothy. They are special agents running from an unknown threat, and have a marriage that is in trouble.

The couple do not know God. They have been running from Him but God is relentless in His pursuit of His children.

God uses people to accomplish His will. We need to have lives that are in tune with Him. “Thank you, Piper, for your boldness… I felt the nudge.” Sometimes God will ask us to do things that requires us to step out in faith, in order to help others in their faith walk. When God says ‘do it!’ Do not question, just do it! The fate of others may rely on our faithfulness.

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Being Ethel: In A World That Loves Lucy by Michele Olson

Apr26

So Delightful

Being Ethel: In A World That Loves Lucy by Michele Olson is an absolutely charming Christian novel that I adored. It is the first book in the Mackinac Island series and I cannot wait to read the rest.

As the series title suggests, the book is set on Mackinac Island in 1979. The Grand Hotel takes centre stage as a new movie, Somewhere In Time is being filmed. This, as it happens, is one of my all-time favourite movies. I, therefore, found the location easy to picture.

The leading lady has experienced a huge loss. Her emotions are conflicting as she experiences, guilt, anger and grief. Her walk with God has been damaged. “Being mad at myself, and God.” She feels that her father, an evangelist, escaped justice by dying (before the book opened.) “It’s quite a trip to see a person ooze love and acceptance in the pulpit yet act the way he did at our house.” Her father did not walk the walk in private, only when he was in the spotlight.

There is anger at God too, for allowing the deaths of her mother and twin sister (before the book opened.) The leading lady views God as a God of wrath. An encounter with a godly nun, opens her eyes. “I don’t want to fall into a religion trap, I just want to know Him [Jesus], His Father and the Holy Spirit.” It is all about relationship and not religion. After years of living in the shadows, “my self-worth comes from who I am to the Lord.”

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