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It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old…or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

and the book:

Perished: The World That Was

PublishAmerica (December 17, 2010)

***Special thanks to R. Frederick Riddle for sending me a review copy.***

Born in 1943, R. Frederick Riddle served in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam War as a Radioman. He received Christ as his Saviour in 1973.

He worked for Michigan Bell and later Ameritech (now AT&T) until 1993 when he retired. Riddle went to work for a Baptist Church as Financial Secretary until 2008 when he retired a second time and moved to Florida to care of his mother-in-law.

He published his first novel in 2003 and his second in 2007. The novel, Perished, draws on both of those novels and much more research. He is currently working on a sequel to Perished.

Visit the author’s website.

When God creates the heavens, and earth, the archangel Lucifer refuses to believe and, with the creation of man, he rebels. Adam and Woman (Eve) enjoy sweet fellowship with God, but Satan makes war against God. Using Serpent, he tricks Woman into eating the forbidden fruit, which Adam knowingly eats; thus bringing sin unto all mankind. In holy anger He drives them out of Eden, while at the same time extending His grace and promising a Redeemer.

Adam and Eve start a family, but tragedy strikes as Cain slays Abel and God drives him from their home. He goes to land of Nod and starts a new civilization, thus beginning a struggle between good and evil. While conflicts grow, faith in God also grows and is demonstrated in the lives of Adam, Methuselah, Noah, and others. As society makes marvelous advances immorality rises, bringing upon them the judgment of God.
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Product Details:

List Price: $29.95
Paperback: 344 pages
Publisher: PublishAmerica (December 17, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1456036823
ISBN-13: 978-1456036829

ISLAND BREEZES

This was a thoroughly enjoyable book.  It was packed with history and biographies brought to life.

Of course, this is fiction based on truth, and right to the end pronounces the truth for all.

I don’t know if Mr. Riddle plans to continue this saga, but I certainly hope so.  This book now has me rereading Genesis.

Next, I’ll be checking out his first two books, Refuge: The Genesis Chronicles, and Adam’s Chronicles.

AND NOW…THE FIRST CHAPTER:

ETERNITY PAST

Lucifer looked around in confusion. I was about to say something to Michael. Why did I stop? Suddenly his thoughts were interrupted.

“Behold, I am God, the Beginning and the Ending, The Everlasting One. Out of nothing have I created you. I have designed each of you for a specific purpose, a certain service to perform.

“Michael, thou wert created to lead My armies into battle and to guard the battle mounts of heaven. I have made thee an archangel and a Chief Prince. Under thee there shall be one third of all the angels able to wage war.

“I have set thee as one of the three and thou shalt be mighty in all that thou shalt do.

“Gabriel, thou art created to speak on My behalf. Thou shalt rule over all manner of communication. Your task is to ensure that My messages and commands are delivered to whomsoever I desire. To thee have I given another third of all the angels equipped to carry out your tasks. You also are an archangel and one of the three.”

I already knew that, Lucifer thought.

“And Lucifer, to thee I have given great beauty. No creature shall have greater beauty than you possess. As an archangel, and one of the three, thou also shalt lead one third of the angels of heaven in singing My praises. You are over all manner of instruments of music and praise, which shall be to My glory!

“But I have also made thee the covering cherub and thou shalt guard the Thrones.”

Lucifer looked at Michael and Gabriel, who didn’t appear to be puzzled at all. But he found himself wondering: Why is the Holy Father telling us our duties. We have been doing them forever. And what is this about creation?

“What does He mean He created us? We have been around for a long time.”

Pondering Lucifer’s question, which he found intriguing, Michael thought back and couldn’t remember a single time when he hadn’t been an archangel. Looking around, he noted that everything looked as it always had looked. The walls, he thought, look the same. Each is built with glorious gemstones, one sitting upon the other in perfect symmetry. It is still as immense as ever! Is it possible that they were just created?

And what about these mansions that have been tended regularly by countless angels for ages past? It is true they are empty, with no apparent purpose. But that has always been the case. And there are just as many mansions as ever. Everything is just as I remember. Even the gold pavement, with each tile perfect and beautiful, looks the same!

“It appears that way,” he replied. “Everything is as it always has been. I do not remember a thing different. But if the Holy Father says that He just created us it must be true. The Elohim is truth.”

“It does seem strange,” agreed Gabriel. “But as Michael stated, the Elohim is truth and would not lie. Yet we all remember everything as being perfectly normal.

“I do admit, however, that I cannot remember any specific event throughout eternity. I remember every structure of the City, but I cannot recall a single moment when any were erected. I should at least remember where the gems came from for the walls. But I do not.

“I believe we have been created with complete memories enabling each of us to do our assigned tasks better. My job is to head up God’s communications and to see that His words are communicated to everyone. Yet I do not recall a single message that He has sent. The only way I can understand it is that I have been just created, as He said.

“In addition, He has given each of us unique talents to accomplish our tasks. And He gave you great beauty, Lucifer. They are the Elohim and can do whatever They want!”

“That sounds reasonable to me,” Michael said. “That would explain how all this,” he paused spreading his hands indicating the City, “is so familiar to me. God placed the memory of it in my mind.”

“You must be right, of course,” Lucifer acknowledged. But inwardly he doubted.

The three archangels broke up, each going his separate way. Lucifer could not remember what it was that he had been about to say to Michael. He shrugged and departed.

&&&

Lucifer sensed the excitement as the angels were buzzing with excited whispers and tensely alert. Something big is about to happen. His attention was suddenly riveted upon a huge empty window that appeared over the City’s highest spires. At that moment the Holy Father spoke:

“Behold as I, the God and Creator of all things great and small, create the earth out of nothing. I declare that there shall be seasons and times.”

All the angels watched as the Holy Father spoke and the window suddenly filled with a solitary, fiery mass. Lucifer and all the angels were rooted in astonishment.

It took on a definite oval shape filled with water. The entire host of heaven watched as the Holy Spirit of God moved upon the water causing it to vibrate. Lucifer wasn’t sure if he was hearing the vibration or simply sensing it, but its effect upon the water was obvious as wave after wave cooled the fledgling planet. This time the Holy Son spoke:

“Let there be light.”

Immediately the dark planet was ablaze with light. Lucifer was mystified. Where is the light coming from? Suddenly he knew. The Holy Son is Himself the Source of light!

Next, the Holy Son did an amazing thing dividing the light into night and day. Earth started rotating on its axis. Watching with all the angels, Lucifer immediately understood the planet would complete one rotation in 24 hours, which would be divided into minutes and seconds. This is the beginning of time. I must admit that the Holy Son has really created something interesting. Hmmm. It looks like these hours not only lead to days, but also the days lead to weeks and the weeks to months, each having 30 days.

Curious, Lucifer studied the planet intently. Although impressed, Lucifer wasn’t overwhelmed as he imagined such power to create was his as well.

On Day Two the Holy Son spoke again: “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.”

Thus God divided the waters so that they were above and below what He called heaven. Lucifer nodded with sudden understanding. This heaven was the atmosphere. But why the water above the atmosphere? The answer would have to wait as the second day ended.

On Day Three, the Holy Son said: “Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place and let the dry land appear.”

The angels watched in awe as God took the waters on the planet’s surface and gathered them together into seas. For the first time, land rose from under the water. Amazingly the land was dry, except for rivers appearing here and there. Then something happened causing all of heaven to cry in sheer delight, impressing even Lucifer. The Holy Son created a living thing! Grass, herbs, trees, fruit, and vegetables came into being with the ability to reproduce after themselves.

On Day Four the Holy Son created all the stars of heaven. But Lucifer noted, with surprise, the sudden existence of galaxies and solar systems populated with their own stars and planets. Amazingly each was created fully formed with the appearance of age and moving through space as though from an explosion!

The sun was also created shedding its light upon the Earth and replacing the Son’s light. He placed a moon in orbit around the Earth reflecting the sun’s light during the night.

Now Lucifer understood the purpose of the waters above the earth’s atmosphere and surrounding the planet. It acts like a filter! And it shields the earth from the sun’s rays. But why? Again his silent question went unanswered.

On Day Five, God moved again. He created living creatures. Even as He spoke “Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth” there appeared all manner of aquatic life. Some of these were tiny fish while others were large whales, dolphins, sharks and gigantic sea creatures! The air was filled with birds, small and great, flying about with great abandon.

“Be fruitful,” God commanded, “and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.”

Lucifer shook his head in wonder. Not only was he impressed with God’s demonstration of power, but he was also deeply disturbed. Why are the Elohim using their power to create a planet with such primitive life forms? Of what purpose can they serve?

On Day Six, the Son culminated His work with two great acts of creation. First, He created all animals.

“Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind.”

Soon the dry land was populated with a variety of animals, some very small and others gigantic to the point of towering over some of the trees. As with aquatic life, each had the ability to reproduce itself after its own kind.

But it was the creation of human life that stunned and troubled Lucifer the most. The Son said to God the Father and God the Spirit, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.”

A hush permeated the heavens as God prepared the earth’s soil and carefully, almost tenderly, formed the first man. All of heaven looked upon the still creature in awe.

Lucifer had to admit that the Holy Son had done a masterful job. And he was impressed with the ingenious idea of the water surrounding the earth. He now realized that the filtering affect would also protect the humans.

But it took all Three to accomplish these creative acts. I could have done the same without any help. Maybe I can do things God cannot do. And why create man when the angels of heaven are available to accomplish His will? In what possible way is mankind better equipped than the angels to rule over the Earth? Why does He regard man so tenderly?

&&&

Taking the still creature, God breathed the breath of life into it and immediately its chest started rising and falling rhythmically. The angels erupted into choruses of praise.

As the creature became conscious the coolness of the morning caused him to shiver. Opening his eyes, he looked up at God, Who smiled down at him.

“I am Eloahh, your Creator. Thy name is Adam: for out of the earth were you taken. Arise and see what I have done.”

Deity! Recognition brightened Adam’s face.

God extended His hand and pulled Adam upright. It was in that moment that Adam looked at his own body in wonder. Holding his hands outward, he noticed the slender fingers and how he could easily move them. His arms were thick and muscular while covered with very fine hair.

Looking down, he took note of his chest tapering down to the belly, which was hard and flat. Like his arms, his legs were covered by fine hair, but there the likeness stopped. He had short, powerful legs that rested upon feet having five toes that were similar, yet different, to the five fingers of each hand.

Again God spoke: “In six days I created the earth and the heavens and all that is in them. You have I created after My own image. I have loved you from before the beginning and shall love you always.”

A puzzled look crossed Lucifer’s face as he watched and listened to the scene below.

As for Adam, he would later remember this event in great detail.

“God lifted me up to where He was and I found myself looking upon the circle of Earth with the darkness of space behind it. I can still see the vast variety of blues that were the seas surrounding the land. And there were the browns, greens and a wonderful display of colors covering the ground. In the midst of it all was a large, dominating, barren place where nothing grew at all. But even in its starkness there was a strange, alluring beauty about it. It is a shame that no one will ever see what I saw that day. It was beautiful!”

After showing Adam the earth as seen from outer space, God took Adam back to Earth and hovered above the barren plateau that he had seen. Looking down, Adam saw a vast land that was carpeted with full-grown trees, shrubs, plants and flowers. Scanning the forests he saw mountain ranges to the north and to the south. Momentarily his eyes rested on a mountain range to the southwest that pointed skyward like the fingers on his hands. It was the most majestic sight amongst so many grand sights. Even from the distance, he could see the varied shapes of the pinnacles. And the colors! Purples, browns, reds, oranges, and every color imaginable dotted these mountains. But the strangest sight was the barren ground below him, which stretched for miles in all directions. It struck Adam as being out of place in all the vast beauty.

“Now behold! I create a special Garden for you.”

Before Adam’s startled eyes, God covered the plateau with a thick blanket of rich soil hundreds of feet thick. He planted trees, bushes and every kind of vegetation imaginable before placing animals, a pair of every kind, within this beautiful Garden and transforming it into a magnificent paradise. It was the most beautiful place that he would ever know.

Looking down, Adam watched in amazement and awe as the mountain he had earlier stood upon, collapsed forming a series of hills. Adam would later write of this moment: “Seen from above, the Garden was astounding, a sheer delight. I still remember the towering trees rising from the Garden’s fertile ground pointing towards heaven.

“I think some of the trees were over two hundred feet high. From heaven looking down, it was like a roof. Not made of bricks, wood and mud as today’s homes are made, but of leaves overlapping leaves. . It was so close and looked so firm that I felt like I could walk upon it. Far below, I later discovered that under that tree canopy there were areas of complete darkness, so dark that it was almost like night!

“The garden is not a small grove or even a sheep range, but much larger. In the 40 days that Eve and I lived there, we never saw all that existed within its borders.

“Hanging suspended in the sky and looking down, I could see its whole expanse. Circling the garden is a huge hedge, which I have touched. It is strong and impenetrable. I have since learned that on the opposite side are briars that can tear a man’s skin. Whether they existed from the beginning, I do not know. I suspect that they are part of the curse.

“Inside the garden is every tree imaginable, plus gorgeous flowers, plants and so much more. The sheer beauty of the place took my breath away! In most areas of the Garden were large flowering plants blending together to make a beautiful and colorful blanket covering the land. It is a tragedy that no one else will ever see it as I did.

“But that is not what I remember most about my first sight of Eden. It was Eden River flowing from Lake Eden in the west to the Falls in the east. And Lake Eden was, and most likely still is, startling in its beauty. I knew right then that I wanted to see it up close, to experience it!

“However, if you were to ask my wife, she would tell you her favorite remembrance is the Grove. This is where some of the most delicious fruits are found. The Grove is located just south of the river and stretches to the southern hedge. She and Serpent would explore this area every day it seemed. And she would return with new and exciting fruits, all of which she named. She would share these with me and later, in the cool of the evening, with God. It brought her great joy when God would taste of her discovery and praise her.

“However, the Garden of Eden is more than a beautiful place with fine foods; it is where we walked with God. With tears I remember those precious times we spent with Him every morning and evening. Sometimes He would guide us to something He wanted us to see, but most of the time He would simply sit and talk with us. It is with great joy and bitter tears I remember the day when He created me and placed me within its borders!”

Martha Loses Hope As She Looks For The Messiah…and A Miracle.

Author Diana Wallis Taylor creates a beautiful story set in the New Testament following the life of Martha of Bethany, sister of Mary and Lazarus in Martha (ISBN: 978-0-8007-3465-7, $14.99, 256 pages, June). The busyness of Martha is well-known, identified with, studied, and often misunderstood by people today. Often painted in the colors of reproach, Martha seems to be the poster child for how not to be a follower of Jesus. Taylor provides a well-researched touching portrayal of Martha.

When her mother dies leaving young Martha in charge of the household, her family is dependant upon her to oversee the home. Yet like other girls in her village, Martha longs to be married and begin her own family. Considered a fine cook and weaver, Martha is quick to help others within her community. She experiences the hope of love and love lost, trials, friendship, the death of her father, the overwhelming duty to her family, the discovery of the Messiah, the miracles witnessed at the Temple, and the hospitality she shows to her Lord with dignity and grace. However, when Lazarus becomes ill and Jesus is too late – Martha questions both her faith and the Lord. How could she know that one of the Lord’s greatest miracles was only moments away? Through the life of Martha, Taylor shows readers a new perspective and appreciation for this special woman of the New Testament.

ISLAND BREEZES

God comes through for Martha.

This book gives us a different way to look at Martha instead of seeing her just focused on getting things done.

We are given possible reasons as to why she wasn’t always sitting at the feet of Jesus like her sister, Mary.

This book also brings to light some of what might have been Lazarus’ feelings and actions after his resurrection.

And then there’s the ending. It made me smile. I really like these characters and look forward to more Biblical novels by Ms. Taylor.

***Thank you to Donna Hausler for providing a review copy.***

Diana Wallis Taylor enjoys speaking to women’s groups and teaching writing and poetry workshops. She is the author of Journey to the Well, has published many articles, and contributed stories to several books. Taylor lives in California. Find out more at www.dianawallistaylor.com.

Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group, offers practical books that bring the Christian faith to everyday life.? They publish resources from a variety of well-known brands and authors, including their partnership with MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) and Hungry Planet.

Available June 2011 at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old…or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

and the book:

100 Days of Favor

Charisma House (June 7, 2011)

***Special thanks to Anna Coelho Silva | Publicity Coordinator, Charisma House | Charisma Media for sending me a review copy.***

Joseph Prince is a leading voice in proclaiming the gospel of grace around the world through his teaching resources and television ministry. With more than two decades of full-time ministry behind him, Joseph Prince is known for teaching God’s Word in a fresh, practical, and revelatory way that always unveils Jesus. He is the senior pastor of New Creation Church (www.newcreation.org.sg) in Singapore, which has a congregation of more than 19,000 members, and heads Joseph Prince Ministries, Inc.

Visit the author’s website.

Embark on a powerful journey to experience the unmerited favor of God.

You don’t need to depend on your own strength to succeed. Immerse yourself in God’s unmerited favor and change your life forever! 100 Days of Favor shows you how to develop a favor-consciousness in everything you do. Each daily topic includes:

Today’s Scripture—a biblical foundation for the topic

Today’s Inspirational Excerpt From Unmerited Favor—a key truth about God’s unmerited favor

Today’s Prayer—a way to express your heart to our heavenly Father

Today’s Thought—a liberating, favor-inspired idea for the day

Today’s Reflection on Favor—a place to journal what the Holy Spirit brings to your mind

With daily inspirational scriptures, prayers, and readings from Unmerited Favor, you can begin your day with a focus on God’s grace and love.

Product Details:

List Price: $15.99
Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Charisma House (June 7, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1616384492
ISBN-13: 978-1616384494

ISLAND BREEZES

I didn’t know much about Joseph Prince before receiving this book.  I rarely watch television, but I had caught his program a couple times, and I liked what I heard.

I’ve been using this book during my devoted time.  I like the way he ties together Scripture with readings from Unmerited favor, a prayer and daily thought.

Although there’s also a place to write in your reflections, I write mine in a journal instead.  I like to share my books with others when I’ve finished reading them.

AND NOW…THE FIRST CHAPTER:

If you would simply set aside these 100 days to just immerse and saturate yourself in the unmerited favor of God, I believe with all my heart that your life will never be the same again. Every morning as you are sitting with a warm mug of coffee in your hand, simply pick up this book. I’d like us to spend 15 minutes together and have an intimate chat about Jesus. I believe that these precious minutes will help you calibrate your thinking for the rest of the day. And when your mind is set on the favor of the Lord, you will begin to experience like never before a confident expectation of good, regardless of the adversity or challenge that is thrown your way.

My friend, when you begin living with the consciousness of God’s unmerited favor, you will savor and enjoy the beautiful plan and purposes that God is unfolding in your life. When you focus on His grace, His favor and His love for you daily, you are putting a magnifying glass over your life and allowing Jesus’ love to beam down upon you in all its radiance, beauty and warmth. No matter what may be happening around you, you will be anchored in the security of His perfect love, hidden in the cleft of the immovable Rock of all ages—your loving Savior, Jesus Christ.

This is an invitation to take the next 100 days as a commitment to soak yourself in the unmerited favor of God. Pull yourself away from the noise, chaos, clutter and busyness of life, and come under the refreshing waterfall of God’s favor. Take this time to simply sit at Jesus’ feet and enjoy His Word. You’ll find the stress of work, family commitments, people’s expectations and even the fear of the future melting away.

100 Days Of Favor is based on my book, Unmerited Favor. Each bite-sized, inspirational reading includes:

• Today’s Scripture—A scripture that relates to the inspirational reading, giving it a biblical foundation and helping you to understand the truths presented. I encourage you to meditate on each scripture for the day. You’ll be surprised how much the Holy Spirit will open up God’s Word to you and refresh your heart!

• Today’s Inspirational Excerpt From Unmerited Favor—A key truth or nugget about God’s unmerited favor that will surely equip, bless and empower you. These truths cover what God’s unmerited favor is, what it can do for you and how you can develop favor-consciousness to experience good success.

• Today’s Prayer—Don’t know what or how to pray for a breakthrough? These prayers will help you express all that’s in your heart to your heavenly Father. Feel free to adapt them to your own situation. Just speak from your heart. The effective, fervent prayer of a child of God avails much. Your Father is listening!

• Today’s Thought—The mind is where the real battle usually takes place. So start your day with a liberating, favor-inspired thought. The best way to guard your mind is to fill it with God’s precious thoughts toward you!
• Today’s Reflection On Favor—As you prayerfully read each day’s inspirational word, take time to journal the things that the Holy Spirit brings to your attention and encourages you to meditate on.

Anyway, that cave was really high up, so I don’t know how in the world that cow had gotten up there!
But right there and then, the Lord began to speak to me. He said that many come to church and approach His Word like the other cows grazing at the bottom of the mountain—they simply eat and go. Conversely, this cow that was chewing the cud, ruminating and taking its time to absorb all the nutrients, was kept in a high place—a place of rest, security and perfect calm.
The entire experience was simply amazing. Right there, caressed by the cool winds that swept gently across Mount Arbel, the Lord was teaching me an object lesson on meditating on His Word. He was showing me that when we come to receive His living Word, whether in church on a Sunday or in our quiet moments, He does not want us to simply graze and go. He wants us to take His Word, chew on it and savor it. He wants us to ruminate and meditate upon it. My friend, take a verse or thought from the Lord and chew on it until it bursts forth within you and becomes a revelation in your heart.
Now, biblical meditation involves giving voice to the scripture that you are meditating on. If you look up the word “meditate” in Hebrew (from Psalm 1:2 and Joshua 1:8), it is the word hagah, which means “to mutter.” So when you meditate on a particular scripture, you should essentially be speaking it to yourself. Speak it out over and over again. Pore over every word and let each one feed and nourish you. Do that and you will be lifted up, elevated into the secret place of the Most High God, far from any form of oppression, anxiety or fear, and enclosed within the embrace of His mighty wings (Psalm 91). That is the power of biblical meditation. I believe with all of my heart that you will experience this rest for your soul as you meditate on the Word and immerse yourself completely in the Lord’s unmerited favor for you over the next 100 days.
So what are you waiting for? Let’s get started!

Day 1

The Power Of Looking To Jesus

Today’s Scripture
But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. —2 Corinthians 3:18

I love to preach about looking at Jesus and being Christ-occupied instead of being self-occupied. But what is the value of seeing Jesus? How does this put money in your bank account and food on your table? How does this help your children in their studies? Believers who have asked me these questions think that they are being pragmatic, but they don’t realize that miracles happen when they keep their eyes on Jesus.

Look at what happened to a fisherman called Peter, who was one of Jesus’ disciples, in Matthew 14:22–33. When his boat was in the middle of a lake, the most practical thing for a seasoned fisherman to do was to stay in the boat. Science tells you that when you step out into the water, you will sink!
Keep your eyes on Jesus. While it may sound impractical, it is the most powerful thing you can do, and Jesus will cause you to reign over every storm in your life!
But the greatest miracle that Peter experienced happened one night when he stepped out of his boat in the middle of a storm at Jesus’ word. That night, the winds were boisterous, but as long as Peter kept his eyes on Jesus, he did the impossible—he walked on water. Jesus was walking on the water and when Peter looked at Jesus, he became like Jesus and did the supernatural. God’s Word declares that “we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”
Beloved, as Jesus is, so are you in this world. When you keep your focus on Jesus, you are transformed into His image from glory to glory. You are transformed by beholding, not by working. When you see that Jesus is above the storms of your life, you will effortlessly rise above those storms. No amount of self-effort could have helped Peter walk on water. When he did, it happened simply because he was looking at Jesus.

Now, observe what happened the moment Peter turned his eyes away from Jesus, and started to look at the wind and the waves around him. In that instance, Peter became natural and he began to sink. Now, let’s imagine that there was no storm, no howling winds and no crashing waves that night. Let’s imagine that it was a perfectly calm evening and the Sea of Galilee was as still as a mirror without a single ripple on its surface. Could Peter have walked on water then? Of course not!

Walking on water is not something anyone can do whether or not the water is calm. The wind and waves actually made no difference to Peter’s ability to walk on the water. The best thing Peter could have done was to keep his eyes on Jesus and not look at the storm. In the same way, instead of looking at how insurmountable your circumstances and challenges are, turn away from them and keep your eyes on Jesus. While it may sound impractical, it is the most powerful thing you can do, and Jesus will cause you to reign over every storm in your life!

Let me share with you a testimony from a lady in our church. She went for a mammogram one morning and the doctors found some lumps in her breast. They told her to return to the clinic in the afternoon so that they could perform further tests to determine if the lumps were cancerous. But this lady was fresh from hearing me teach that as Jesus is, so are we in this world. So before she returned to the clinic for the biopsy, she actually wrote on her medical report, “Does Jesus have lumps in His breast? As He is, so am I in this world.” That afternoon, she went for further tests and guess what! The doctors told her that there must have been a mistake—they could find no lumps! Do you know why?

Because as He is, so is she!
You have just seen the power of looking to Jesus. If you think that simply looking to Christ is impractical, I am challenging you today to see that it is not. In fact, it is the most practical thing you can ever do. Keep your eyes on Jesus and you will become more and more like Him—full of health, strength, wisdom and life!

Today’s Prayer
Father, I know that a man cannot walk on water, whether in stormy or calm conditions. Likewise, whether there are problems in my life or not, I cannot reign in life without Jesus. Apart from Him, I can do NOTHING. Therefore, I ask that You help me keep my eyes on Jesus despite the many things that I have to attend to today. I thank You that as I look to Jesus for all my needs and wants in the midst of every difficulty and challenge, He will place me at the right place at the right time and provide me with every resource I need to experience good success!

Today’s Thought
I can walk above my problems when I keep my eyes on Jesus and trust Him.

 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. 

Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. 

Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never drive away; for I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. 

And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. 

This is indeed the will of my Father, that all who see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life; and I will raise them up on the last day.”

John 6:35-40

Young Socialite Switches Places with Amish Girl to Escape Manhattan Scene!

“Why does everything have to be so complicated?” Madison shook her Blackberry at her mom…

Bestselling author Melody Carlson takes readers into the worlds of a socialite and an Amish girl struggling with who they are in Double Take (ISBN: 978-0-8007-1964-7, June 2011, $9.99). Have you ever wondered what would happen if you could switch your life with someone else for just one day? Readers will live the one-week experiences of a bored Amish girl and stressed out socialite when they decide to switch places in Double Take.

Spring break has arrived. It’s her senior year, and Madison Van Buren is fed up with her surroundings and the pressures of life. Stressed out over choosing an Ivy League school that will please her parents, their marital problems, and her boyfriend’s pressure, Madison gets in her car and drives west.

Meanwhile, eighteen-year-old Anna Fisher wants to escape the so-called simple life–which for her consists of caring for younger siblings, sewing, cooking, and gardening–and she’s well aware that her future will simply be more of the same with a man she doesn’t love.

Madison and Anna stumble into each other in a small town. Realizing their looks are uncannily similar, they both think their lives are boring. Thinking the grass is greener on the other side, they make a decision that will transform them forever and switch lives for one week.

Readers will love this funny and provocative tale of switching places from bestselling author Melody Carlson. As they get a glimpse and understanding of these two very different worlds. They may find themselves happy to be just who they are, and where they are.

ISLAND BREEZES

Oh, my. What an adventure! I promised myself that I was only going to read an hour tops before going to bed. It didn’t take long to break that promise. I finished the book in one sitting.

I was sure those two young ladies would not be able to pull off such a switch. There’s definitely a world of difference between a Manhattan penthouse and an Amish farm house.

Melody Carlson never fails to come up with a good book. Technically, it’s labeled as teen fiction and my teenage granddaughter does enjoy Melody’s books. So does Granny Nanny.

***Thanks to Donna Hausler for providing a review copy***

Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group, offers practical books that bring the Christian faith to everyday life.? They publish resources from a variety of well-known brands and authors, including their partnership with MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) and Hungry Planet.

Available June 2011 at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old…or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

and the book:

The Blackberry Bush

Summerside Press (June 1, 2011)

***Special thanks to Audra Jennings, Senior Media Specialist, The B&B Media Group for sending me a review copy.***

David Housholder is a philosophical-spiritual influencer, a sponsored snowboarder and a surfing instructor who dreams of making this world a better place. As the senior pastor at Robinwood Church, an indie warehouse church near the beach in California, he can often be found preaching verse by verse in his bare feet. With his increasing desire to change the world around him, he is the director for several non-profit organizations. Housholder loves to travel and is an international conference speaker. He has spoken to groups in Ethiopia, Malaysia, Canada and London and has also been involved with mission trips. He is especially energized by evangelistic work among Muslims.

Housholder is an avid reader and carries an unquenchable thirst for knowledge. He received his undergraduate degree from Pacific Lutheran University and went on to receive his Master of Divinity from the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago. Then he spent a year as a Fulbright Scholar at the Universität-Bonn in Germany. Housholder fluently speaks three languages, English, Dutch and German, and enjoys reading biblical Greek and Hebrew.

Housholder and his wife, Wendy, have one grown son, Lars. They reside in Huntington Beach, California. Some of his hobbies include photography and tinkering on his 1971 VW bug.

Visit the author’s website.

The Blackberry Bush begins with two babies, Kati and Josh, who are born on opposite sides of the world at the very moment the Berlin Wall falls. You would think that such a potent freedom metaphor would become the soundtrack for their lives, but nothing could be further from the truth. They will follow a parallel path connected by a mistake their great grandparents made years before.

Despite his flawless image, Josh, an artistic and gifted Californian skateboarder and surfer, struggles to find his true role in the world. He fears that his growing aggression will eventually break him if he can’t find a way to accept his talent and the competition that comes along with it. Kati, a German with a penchant for classic Swiss watches and attic treasure-hunting, is crushed with the disappointment of never being “enough” for anyone—especially her mother. She wonders whether she will ever find the acceptance and love she craves and become comfortable in her own skin.

Craving liberation, Kati and Josh seem destined to claim their birthright of freedom together. With the help of their loving grandparents, they will unlock the secrets of their pasts and find freedom and joy in their futures. Today, like Katie and Josh, our youth often fall into two different cultures. Josh is part of the “bro” culture which is outdoor-oriented, with sports as a focus, and generally more conservative. Whereas Kati is part of the “scene” culture which is more liberal and indoor-oriented, focusing on music. These cultures are apparent in the novel and can aid in a better understanding of the issues today’s 21st century youth are facing as well as the struggles they have in coming to faith.

Product Details:

List Price: $14.99
Paperback: 208 pages
Publisher: Summerside Press (June 1, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1609361164
ISBN-13: 978-1609361167

ISLAND BREEZES

I was really loving on this book before I even started reading it.  The feel of the cover, the rough page edges and just a good size to hold comfortably.

this is a story of two people connected by the historic date of their birth – the day the Berlin wall fell.

They are connected in other ways, but it seems as if they might never meet.  Finally they are both in California at the same time, and they meet without knowing.

As I read this book, I thought that they might end up as marriage partners.

All along we have Angelo giving us the backstory.  This gives us motivation to find our own backstory.  It really makes one stop and think.

I’m really looking forward to the next book in this series.  There will be more books.  Right, Mr. Housholder?

AND NOW…THE FIRST CHAPTER:

Angelo

Think for a moment. Isn’t there a splendid randomness to the way your day is coming together today?

After all, it’s not the big, dramatic things we foresee and expect that make all the difference in our lives. It’s the chance, random encounters—the subtle things that surprise us…and change the very course of our individual destinies.

The Blackberry Bush is a story about awakening to the fullness of this reality.

And you will never want to go back to sleep.

You can call me Angelo. I’ll be the one telling this story. As you and I travel together across generations and continents in a journey that will take just a few hours, you’ll discover not only the gripping stories of Kati, Josh, Walter, Nellie, and Janine but also uncover your own compelling back-story that will change you in ways you can never imagine.

And you’ll never be the same again….

PROLOGUE

1989

Berlin, Germany

Occasionally, out of nowhere, history turns on a dime in a way no one sees coming. Listen…do you hear the sound of jackhammers on dirty concrete?

“Wir sind ein Volk(We are one people)!” A large European outdoor crowd chants this over and over into the chilly November night. “Wir sind ein Volk!”

Thousands of hands hold candles high in the darkening night of Berlin. Throngs of young people with brightly colored scarves crowd the open spaces between concrete buildings. !ere are parties—with exuberant celebrants of all ages—even along the actual top of the wall. Flowers are stuffed into once-lethal Kalashnikov rises. Hope is contagious.

It’s November 9, 1989. The first sections of the Berlin Wall are removed, to mass cheers, with heavy machinery. It seems incomprehensible that a small weekly Monday prayer meeting in Pastor Magerius’s Leipzig, Germany, study grew into the pews of the Nicolai Church and eventually out into the Leipzig city square. !en today, this “Peace Prayer,” figuratively speaking, traveled up the Autobahn to Berlin and converged as an army of liberation on that iconic concrete symbol of Cold War division—with world-news cameras whirring.

Little things can make a big difference. Subtle potency. Gentle power.

“Wir sind ein Volk,” the crowd chants as one. The Berlin Wall—a filthy, gravity-based ring of rebar and concrete, tangled with barbed wire and patrolled by German shepherd attack dogs–has encircled and separated West from East for twenty-eight years. Now it is irreparably pierced.

Unthinkable. No one saw this coming.

Walls are real, you see, yet they always come down. Creation and nature never favor walls. They start to crumble, even before the mortar dries.

*

Elisabeth Hospital

Bonn, Germany

A day’s Autobahn drive from the festivities in Berlin

That same instant, a severely pregnant woman’s water breaks in the tall-windowed birthing room of the Elisabeth Hospital in Bonn, Germany.

Hours later: “Ein Mädchen (a girl)!” Een meisje, translates the exhausted mother with silently moving lips into her native Dutch. Linda, a sojourner in Germany, was born a generation ago in Holland.

Mere blocks away from the birth scene, the mighty Rhine River flows past Bonn on its way downstream to the massive industrial port city of Rotterdam, Linda’s hometown. Only a few hours away by river barge, Rotterdam, Holland, couldn’t be farther from Germany—on so many levels.

The labor has been long and brutally hard. !e father, Konrad, takes little newborn, black-haired Katarina up the elevator to the nursery. On the way up, an old woman in a wheelchair spontaneously

pronounces God’s blessing over baby “Kati” (pronounced “KAH-tee,” in the German way) with the sign of the cross. Kati focuses her glassy little eyes on the woman’s wristwatch.

Konrad is concerned about how pale Katarina is. Was her older sister, Johanna, this porcelain-skinned at birth? Perhaps it’s the thick shock of black hair that sharpens the contrast with her complexion. How will Kati and Johanna get along? he wonders. I guess that will all

start to unfold soon, when they meet each other for the first time.

I won’t be able to protect her, thinks Konrad. Parental anxiety starts creeping up his spine in ways it never did when Johanna, now two, was born.

Perhaps little Kati will need that elevator blessing, he muses uncomfortably.

*

Zarzamora, California

1989

Another Woman With Rotterdam Bloodlines, across the planet in sunny Zarzamora, California, is giving birth at the very same moment (although earlier in the day because of the time difference) to a boy. !e tiny $at-roofed hospital up in the mountains of the Los Padres forest is the port of entry for little baby Joshua.

Janine smiles up at husband, Michael, and takes a first look at Josh, expecting, for whatever reason, to see a pale baby girl. Genuinely surprised—after all, this is in the days before ultrasound was universal—to see a vibrant, reddish-hued boy, she suppresses a giggle of delight, a catharsis of joy after so many miscarriages. What fun they will have together! Will he lighten up her melancholy

disposition, perhaps?

Janine sighs in relief as she confirms to herself, We’re not going to have to take care of him much. He’s going to be okay. I’m sure of it. I can tell.

The trumpets of the practicing local high school marching band waft through the open windows as German-born father Michael washes his son off in the sink of the delivery room. The piercing eyes of baby Josh, almost white-blue, glisten in the overhead lights. They stop to focus on Michael for a fleeting minute, then zero in on some yet unseen reality behind his father’s shoulder.

Shouldn’tI be saying some ancient German words, a blessing or something, while I’m doing this? Michael asks himself.

But he can’t think of any. He is adrift in the flowing current of this new experience.

The marching band plays on outside. Are they really circling the hospital, or does it just sound like that? the new father thinks… .

~ Behind the Story ~

Angelo
I can watch both births as I pick and eat blackberries from the thicket back in rainy Bonn. I smile. Joshua looks so happy to be here. He radiates physical warmth and doesn’t seem to need his blanket. He welcomes the new climate.

But Kati doesn’t like the cold. There’s almost a 30-degree (Fahrenheit) difference in ambient temperature from the womb to the room, and I see her struggle.

And then there’s the brand-new “breathing” thing. How can breathing go from unnecessary to essential in a few seconds? Yet some days we don’t even think about breathing, not even once. Amazing. Joshua’s American birth certificate reads 11-09-1989. Kati’s European one reads 09-11-1989.

How much of their lives are preprogrammed? How much of their minds will be stamped with the thoughts of others? Is life a roll of the dice, or is it a script we just read out to the end? Don’t we all

wonder that same thing sometimes?

As Kati and Joshua start to adjust to life outside the womb, the Berlin Wall continues to crumble to shouts of joy.

I write the names Linda and Konrad in Germany, Janine and Michael in California on the inside of the book cover I’m holding. I always do that, so I don’t get confused about who’s who as I travel

through their stories.

Both fathers, Konrad and Michael, have roots in the Germany that was rebuilding after World War II. Both are self-doubting, somewhat weak Rheinlanders married to practical, sober, very Protestant Dutch women.

Katarina and Joshua are on parallel paths. But only perfectly parallel paths never meet as they stretch into infinity. And since these paths, like ours, aren’t perfect…well, you can guess what might happen in this story.

Kati and Josh, born on one of the greatest days of freedom for all human kind, will grow up snared in the blackberry bush…like you.

But if you dare to engage their story at a heart level, a fresh new freedom might just be birthed in you.

So why not listen to that subtle twitter of conception inside your soul? !e one that says, !is year something exciting is going to happen that I can’t anticipate. And I’ll never be the same….

PART ONE
1999

Oberwinter am Rhein, Germany

Just south of Bonn

Kati

I love looking out our back picture window at the rolling farms. I’m watching for Opa, my dear grandfather Harald, who said he’d be home by 4 p.m. We live at the top of the road that winds uphill from the ancient Rhine River town of Oberwinter, just upstream from Bonn. That’s how everybody here writes it, but they say “Ova-venta.” I walk up and down the sidewalk along the switchback road almost every day.

Our home is perched at the top of the hill with the front of the house facing the street that skirts the skyline of the ridge and the back looking away from the river, out at the plateau of peaceful farms, which Opa says the ancient Romans probably worked.

Opa knows a lot of secrets. If he told me what he knows every day for the rest of my life, he’d never run out of things to say. But sometimes he gets sad. He never likes to talk about how things were when he was my age. His voice starts to sound shaky, and that makes me sad too. I stopped asking him about his wartime childhood a long time ago.

My watch says it’s another hour to wait. Really, it’s his watch, big on my wrist. The leather band smells like Opa. I’m very careful with it since it’s a Glashütte, which is infinitely special.

Sometimes Opa shows me his watch collection from the big mahogany box that’s a lot like Mutti’s (that’s what I call my mother) silverware holder. But the Glashütte was always my favorite, and one day he gave it to me. I’ve worn it ever since.

Mutti was angry at Opa for giving it to me. “It’s worth as much as a car!” she said. But Opa simply smiled. He never minds when people are upset with him.

Opa’s study is a magical place. In the corner is the totem polehe brought home from Alaska. !e wooden desk is covered with a sheet hands with peoplein suits and, right in the middle, a recent picture of me. !e books on his shelves are in English and German. He has me read aloud from the chair across the desk from his and tells me that I speak English without an accent, just as they speak it in Seattle, Washington, where he worked for a few years. We’re on our second time through DaleCarnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People. Opa says it’s a very important book, so I believe him.

Opa is the only one who doesn’t seem worried about me. He never seems worried about anything. I can’t remember seeing him angry. Ever.

I hope he takes me out to his workshop in the shed this evening. It’s my favorite place. My big sister, Johanna, says it’s not fun for girls, but she’s wrong. Opa has hand tools and power tools, and all of them are perfectly hung and positioned. !e shed is as clean as Mutti’s kitchen.

Opa tells me that the Bible says all people have “gifts” from God and that all the gifts are open to girls as well as boys. He tells me I have the gifts of craftsmanship and interpretation. Those are big words, but they make me feel good.

We’ve made and fixed so many things together there. I have my own safety glasses. He lets me run the band saw all by myself. I can tell by looking at his eyes that he knows I’ll be safe. Mutti doesn’t have the same look in her eyes, no matter what I’m doing.

Mutti cuts my hair really short because she’s afraid it’s going to get caught in one of the power tools. I hate how it looks. She also tries, continually, to get me to eat more. She doesn’t like how skinny I am.

Papa works in Berlin. He got transferred there when the German government moved from Bonn after the Wall fell, when I was little. He comes home on the train most weekends. He works for the foreign

diplomatic service, and he told me this month that he might get transferred again soon, and that we might have to move to America. He and Muttihave been arguing a lot about it while I try to get to sleep at night.

I can tell the arguments are bad, because Mutti slips back into Dutch when she gets angry and also when she talks to me and Johanna. Anger and parenting seem to come out of the same place inside her.

Mutti, unlike Opa, loves to talk about growing up, and how wonderful everything was then. It’s fun to hear the stories—and to see her smilewhile she tells them. We take the train to visit her Dutch parents often. It takes only a few hours to reach Rotterdam. I love riding through Cologne, past the blackened dual-spired cathedral. I have another grandfather in Holland who is kind of funny and crabby at the same time. I only have one grandmother, because my German Oma died of cancer before I was born.

I love Rotterdam. My Dutch grandfather (my other Opa) takes me on bike rides through the tunnel, under the big river, and to my favorite place—the Hotel New York in the heart of the port. He buys

me a chocolate milk every time, and we watch the big ships come and go. He doesn’t like to talk about Germans, even though he reminds me that they built the bike tunnel and highway under the river. Every now and then someone mentions the War. I’ve always known my Dutch grandparents don’t like my father. They say it’s not because Papa’s German, but I think it is. He never comes along on our visits to Rotterdam.

Now I’m looking out the farm-facing window, still waiting for Opa. At the end of our backyard, the blackberry bushes start and wander off into the countryside in lots of directions. I could swear

they get bigger every year. I love to play back there—especially with Johanna. I don’t ever remember a time when I didn’t have a few scrapes on my arms and legs from the thorns. !e farmers in the fields work so hard to raise crops, but blackberry bushes grow all by themselves without any help.

I’m getting impatient, so I enter Opa’s study to wait there. In his le” second drawer is his drawing kit. Precise instruments to make perfect circles and angles. Papa tells me Opa designed this house with that kit.

Opalets me play with everything in his desk. Using the compass, I draw a perfect circle. !en I draw myself in it. I’ve done this so many times. But I’m older in the picture than in real life. And my hair isn’t short. But I can’t stop drawing circles with slightly different sizes. Once I caught myself drawing dozens of overlapping circles around the picture of me. I’m not smiling in any of these pictures. I think a lot when I’m drawing the circles.

To me, getting older just means harder jobs. Johanna works harder than I do, and I know I’ll have to be like her soon. She evenmakes dinner sometimes. Math problems get harder. Books lose their pictures and are more challenging to read. I learn so much better with Opa, because there’s no pressure.

My parents fight about me when they think I’m asleep. Papa was angry with Mutti because she yelled at me about my school grades. Mutti shot back with, “She has to get good grades because she’s not pretty.” My whole body froze in bed when I heard that. I’m not really sure what grades have to do with being pretty, but it’s very bad somehow. I think Papa would like to be more like Opa, but he can’t make it happen.

They don’t know how good I am at English. I speak it a lot better than they do. I have to keep from laughing when they try. There’s an American couple down in the village with a new baby, living in an

old, crooked apartment. I heard them speaking English and jumped in to their conversation. They asked me where in America I was from.

I fibbed and said, “Seattle.”

I think about America a lot. Maybe I could be a different person there.

Johanna’s pretty; even I can see that. It makes people, all kinds of people, happy to look at her, and they look at her longer than they mean to. I, on the other hand, make people nervous. Except for Opa, people don’t like to look right at me.

And everyone always wants me to do better than I am doing. They say it’s because they want the best for me. But it doesn’t feel good. The older I get, the further behind I am. I don’t have enough

friends. I haven’t finished enough homework. My room is not clean enough. I wasn’tpolite enough to my parents’ guests. And the hardest of all: peopledon’t like me enough. It’s really hard work to get people to like you. Or maybe I’m especially easy to dislike.

Opa’s study has a big mirror on the door. Standing in front of it, I’m surprised by how white my skin is. My hair is black, and I have a big nose. Opa says that’s because most of the families in town have Roman heritage, and that I must have ended up with the local hair and nose. Opa tells me this town has been around for at least a hundred generations. We go for walks in the hills around the village, and he shows me where the Roman roads, walls, and vineyards were. How can anyone know so much?

Even better, Opais the one person who knows me. Last week he brought me a present from Bonn. I opened up the long, little box and removed a black, elegant Pelikanfountain pen. It came with a bottle of ink.

He then pulled out a fresh new ledger. I had to laugh. Opa knows how much I hate math at school. It doesn’t feel real—like somebody got paid to think up a bunch of problems to drive kids like me crazy.

But Opa keeps telling me how important math is for real life, even if I don’t think so now.

For the rest of that afternoon, Opataught me double-entry bookkeeping in ink. Real-life stuff I can actually use even now, when I’m nine years old, to keep track of the little money I earn and spend. He told me that reckoning in German marks was only for practice, because they were going to disappear in a few years, replaced by the euro.

He also taught me that money is magic, and that if you give a lot of it away to improve the world, you’ll always have more left over than you started with. That’s not what my teacher says about

subtraction, but I know, without a doubt, that Opa is right, as usual. He showed me his accounting books, going back to the 1940s. The numbers got bigger and bigger over the years.

“How does that work?” I asked

.

He showed me the number in a special column telling how much he gave away last year. I gasped, and my hand came to my mouth.

“That’s how,” he answered.

I asked him what I would do if I made a bookkeeping mistake with the pen.

“You won’t,” he said and smiled.

Opa believes in God. My parents are not so sure. !is confusesme all the time. Opa takes me to church on Sundays. We walk down the hill together. He and I are evangelisch—Protestant or Evangelical. It’s hard to translate the term into English. Most of our neighbors in Oberwinter are Catholic. Our stone Protestant church is very small, very old, and musty smelling. !e temperature is always cooler inside than outside. I sometimes fall asleep there on Opa’s shoulder, and he likes that.

The organist is amazing. She plays on national radio. And the organ is very old: 1722 is painted on the pipes. For the rest of my life, I’m going to make sure I can listen to organ music. My imagination

can go almost anywhere when she’s playing. After every Sunday service, the organist gives a little concert from the rear balcony where she sits. We stand, lean on the pews behind us, and watch her. We always clap when she’s done.

Johanna comes with us sometimes, but Opa says it’s important to go to church only when you want to. For whatever reason, Opa and I always want to. Maybe it’s just so we can spend Sundays together, but I know Opa would go even if I didn’t exist. It seems to help him be happy all the time and everywhere. I hope he’ll teach me this magic when I’m old enough.

I don’t understand much about what goes on in church, but I love it when they read the Bible stories for children’s worship, and the littler kids come and plop right down on my lap, as if they belong there. !is Sunday was the story about Joshua and the walls of Jericho. The German Bible says the Israelites were blowing trombones, and Opa’s English Bible says trumpets. Things like that make me think.

I hear the door.

Opa’s home.

As a father has compassion for his children, so the Lord has compassion for those who fear him.

Psalm 103:13

And, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Ephesians 6:4

The Gift Of A Camera At Sunset, The Truth Spoken In Love, A Broken Heart Is Revealed, and The Dam Breaks…

There is magic along the marshes in Cedar Key, Florida. Kimberly Tucker may just need reminding. Author Eva Marie Everson takes readers to the beautiful Gulf Coast of Florida in Chasing Sunsets (ISBN: 978-0-8007-3436-7, June 2011, 384 pages, $14.99). Time stands still on this tiny island as visitors and residents admire the beautiful sunrises and sunsets and the friendly smiling faces. But Kimberly struggles with the secrets of her past that seem to be locked away in Cedar Key.

Wondering what went wrong with her marriage and realizing the dreams for their future would not come true, Kimberly resents her former husband for moving on with his life. When a judge orders her sons to spend five weeks of summer vacation with their father, Kimberly’s father suggests a respite in the family vacation home on Cedar Key Island. As Kim revisits her childhood memories and former loves, she soon discovers that treasures in life are often buried, and mistakes–both past and present–become redeemable in God’s hand.

Walk alongside Kimberly in Chasing Sunsets as she discovers that God’s answers may not come easily, but they do come.

ISLAND BREEZES

I really don’t like the way this book ended. It’s too soon. I’m not done reading about these people and Cedar Key. In fact, I’m thinking about getting in my car and finding Cedar Key. Surely it’s no too far from my island.

I like the way this book protruded back and forth between then and now.

And I liked the way Boo learned to deal with her pain – pain that stayed with her from her teen days right on into adulthood.

I want to know more about her life and that of her friend, Patsy, and her family. Just saying. Waiting for the next book Eva Marie Everson.

***Thank you to Donna Hausler for providing a review copy.***

Eva Marie Everson is a successful speaker, a popular radio personality, and the award-winning author of Things Left Unspoken and This Fine Life. She is coauthor of the Potluck Club series and the Potluck Catering Club series. She lives in Florida.

Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group, offers practical books that bring the Christian faith to everyday life.? They publish resources from a variety of well-known brands and authors, including their partnership with MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) and Hungry Planet.

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old…or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

and the book:

Indelible

WaterBrook Press (May 3, 2011)

***Special thanks to Lynette Kittle, Senior Publicist, WaterBrook Multnomah, a Division of Random House for sending me a review copy.***

Kristen Heitzmann’s gift of crafting stories has ranked her as the award-winning and best-selling author of two historical series and twelve contemporary, psychological and romantic suspense novels including Indivisible. As an artist and musician, Kristen lives in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains with her husband and a continuous stream of extended family, various pets, and wildlife.

Visit the author’s website.

Award-wining and best-selling author Kristen Heitzmann brings another suspense story to life in Indelible (WaterBrook, May 3, 2011).

Follow Trevor MacDaniel, a high country outfitter, as he rescues a toddler from the jaws of a mountain lion. Discover how he can’t foresee the far-reaching consequences of his action, how it will entwine his life with gifted sculptor, Natalie Reeve—and attract a grim admirer.

Find out how Trevor’s need to guard and protect is born of tragedy, prompting his decision to become a search and rescue volunteer. And how Natalie’s gift of sculpting comes from an unusual disability that seeks release through her creative hands.

See how in each other they learn strength and courage as they face an incomprehensible foe…a twisted soul, who is drawn by the heroic story of the child’s rescue. One who sees Trevor as archangel and adversary, and threatens their peaceful mountain community—testing Trevor’s limits by targeting their most helpless and innocent.

Product Details:

List Price: $13.99
Paperback: 336 pages
Publisher: WaterBrook Press (May 3, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1400073103
ISBN-13: 978-1400073108

ISLAND BREEZES

This is an incredible book about people who are hurting.  This includes nearly all the people we meet in Redford.

Natalie is a sculptor because of her eidetic memory.  Trevor is a search and rescue volunteer because of tragedy in his past.

Together these two encounter an evil soul who appears ready to kill them both.

This is one of those books that can leave a permanent mark on one’s backside from reading it straight through while perched on the edge of the seat.  If you’re a nail biter, you might as well go out and buy some artificial nails before starting this book.  You’re going to need them.

People’s lives are changed in this book.  I think, too, the reader’s life might be changed as well.

AND NOW…THE FIRST CHAPTER:

“Trevor.” Whit skidded behind him. “We’re not prepared for this.”

No. But he hurled himself after the tawny streak. He was not losing that kid.

“He’s suffocated,” Whit shouted. “His neck’s broken.”

Trevor leaped past a man—probably the dad—gripping his snapped shinbone. Whit could help there. Digging his heels into the shifting pine needles, Trevor gave chase, outmatched and unwavering. His heart pumped hard as he neared the base of the gulch, jumping from a lichen-crusted stone to a fallen trunk. The cougar jumped the creek, lost its grip, and dropped the toddler. Yes.

He splashed into the icy flow, dispersing scattered leaves like startled goldfish. After driving his hand into the water, he gripped a stone and raised it. Not heavy, not nearly heavy enough.

Lowering its head over the helpless prey, the mountain lion snarled a spine-chilling warning. There was no contest, but the cat, an immature male, might not realize its advantage, might not know its fear of man was mere illusion. Thunder crackled. Trevor tasted blood where he’d bitten his tongue.

Advancing, he engaged the cat’s eyes, taunting it to charge or run. The cat backed up, hissing. A yearling cub, able to snatch a tot from the trail, but unprepared for this fearless challenge. Too much adrenaline for fear. Too much blood on the ground.

With a shout, he heaved the rock. As the cat streaked up the mountainside, he charged across the creek to the victim. He’d steeled himself for carnage, but even so, the nearly severed arm, the battered, bloody feet… His nose filled with the musky lion scent, the rusty smell of blood. He reached out. No pulse.

He dropped to his knees as Whit joined him from behind, on guard. He returned the boy’s arm to the socket, and holding it there with one trembling hand, Trevor began CPR with his other. On a victim so small, it took hardly any force, his fingers alone performing the compressions. The lion had failed to trap the victim’s face in its mouth. By grabbing the back of the head, neck, and shoulder, it had actually protected those vulnerable parts. But blood streamed over the toddler’s face from a deep cut high on the scalp, and he still wasn’t breathing.

Trevor bent to puff air into the tiny lungs, compressed again with his fingers, and puffed as lightly as he would to put out a match. Come on. He puffed and compressed while Whit watched for the cat’s return. Predators fought for their kills—even startled ones.

A whine escaped the child’s mouth. He jerked his legs, emitting a highpitched moan. Trevor shucked his jacket and tugged his T-shirt off over his head. He tied the sleeves around the toddler’s arm and shoulder, pulled the rest around, and swaddled the damaged feet—shoes and socks long gone. Thunder reverberated. The first hard drops smacked his skin. Tenderly, he pulled the child into his chest and draped the jacket over as a different rumble chopped the air. They had started up the mountain to find two elderly hikers who’d been separated from their party. Whit must have radioed the helicopter. He looked up. This baby might live because two old guys had gotten lost.

In the melee at the trailhead, Natalie clutched her sister-in-law’s hands, the horror of the ordeal still rocking them. As Aaron and little Cody were airlifted from the mountain, she breathed, “They’re going to be all right.”

“You don’t know that.” Face splotched and pale, Paige swung her head. Though her hair hung in wet blond strands, her makeup was weatherproof, her cologne still detectable. Even dazed, her brother’s wife looked and smelled expensive.

“The lion’s grip protected Cody’s head and neck,” one of the paramedics had told them. “It could have been so much worse.”

Paige started to sob. “His poor arm. What if he loses his arm?”

“Don’t go there.” What good was there in thinking it?

“How will he do the stuff boys do? I thought he’d be like Aaron, the best kid on the team.”

“He’ll be the best kid no matter what.”

“In the Special Olympics?”

Natalie recoiled at the droplets of spit that punctuated the bitter words.

“He’s alive, Paige. What were the odds those men from search and rescue would be right there with a helicopter already on standby?”

“We shouldn’t have needed it.” Paige clenched her teeth. “Aaron’s supposed to be recovering. He would have been if you weren’t such a freak.”

“What?” She’d endured Paige’s unsubtle resentment, but “ freak” ?

“Let me go.” Paige jerked away, careening toward the SUV.

Natalie heard the engine roar, the gravel flung by the spinning tires, but all she saw was the hate in Paige’s eyes, the pain twisting her brother’s face as he held his fractured leg, little Cody in the lion’s maw, the man leaping after…

She needed to clear the images, but it wouldn’t happen here. Around her, press vans and emergency vehicles drained from the lot, leaving the scent of exhaust and tire scars in the rusty mud. Paige had stranded her.

“Freak.”Heart aching, she took a shaky step toward the road. It hadn’t been that long a drive from the studio. A few miles. Maybe five. She hadn’t really watched—because Aaron was watching for her. Off the roster for a pulled oblique, he had seen an opportunity to finalize her venture and help her move, help her settle in, and see if she could do it. She’d been so thankful. How could any of them have known it would come to this? Trevor’s spent muscles shook with dumped adrenaline. He breathed the moist air in through his nose, willing his nerves to relax. Having gotten all they were going to get from him, most of the media had left the trailhead, following the story to the hospital. Unfortunately, Jaz remained.

She said, “You live for this, don’t you?” Pulling her fiery red hair into a messy ponytail didn’t disguise her incendiary nature or the smoldering coals reserved for him. He accepted the towel Whit handed him and wiped the rain from his head and neck, hoping she wouldn’t see the shakes. The late-summer storm had lowered the temperature enough she might think he was shivering.

“Whose idea was it to chase?”

“It’s not like you think about it. You just act.” Typing into her BlackBerry, she said, “Acted without thinking.”

“Come on, Jaz.” She couldn’t still be on his case.

“Interesting your being in place for the dramatic rescue of a pro athlete’s kid. Not enough limelight lately?”

“We were on another search.” She cocked her eyebrow. “You had no idea the victim’s dad plays center field for the Rockies?”

“Yeah, I got his autograph on the way down.” He squinted at the nearly empty parking lot. “Aren’t you following the story?”

“What do you think this is?”

“You got the same as everyone. That’s all I have to say.”

“You told us what happened. I want the guts. How did it feel? What were you thinking?” She planted a hand on her hip. “Buy me a drink?” He’d rather go claw to claw with another mountain lion. But considering the ways she could distort this, he relented. “The Summit?”

“I’d love to.” She pocketed her BlackBerry and headed for her car. Whit raised his brows at her retreat. “Still feeling reckless?”

“Sometimes it’s better to take her head on.”

“Like the cat?” Whit braced his hips.

“The cat was young, inexperienced.”

“You didn’t know that.”

“There was a chance the child wasn’t dead.”

“What if it hadn’t run?”

“If it attacked, you’d have been free to grab the kid.”

“Nice for you, getting mauled.”

“If it got ugly, I’d have shot it.”

“Shot?”

He showed him the Magnum holstered against the small of his back.

Whit stared at him, stone-faced. “You had your gun and you used a rock?”

“I was pretty sure it would run.”

“Pretty sure,” Whit said. “So, what? It wouldn’t be fair to use your weapon?”

It had been the cat against him on some primal level the gun hadn’t entered into. He said, “I could have hit the boy, or the cat could have dropped him down the gulch. When it did let go, I realized its inexperience and knew we had a chance to scare it off. Department of Wildlife can decide its fate. I was after the child.”

“Okay, fine.” With a hard exhale, Whit rubbed his face. “This was bad.”

Trevor nodded. Until today, the worst he’d seen over four years of rescues was a hiker welded to a tree by lightning and an ice climber’s impalement on a jagged rock spear. There’d been no death today, but Whit looked sick. “You’re a new dad. Seeing that little guy had to hit you right in the gut.” Whit canted his head.

“I’m just saying.” Trevor stuffed his shaking hands into his jacket pockets. The storm passed, though the air still smelled of wet earth and rain. He drove Whit back, then went home to shower before meeting Jazmyn Dufoe at the Summit. Maybe he’d just start drinking now. Arms aching, Natalie drove her hands into the clay. On the huge, square Corian table, two busts looked back at her: Aaron in pain, and Paige, her fairy-tale life rent by a primal terror that sprang without warning. She had pushed and drawn and formed the images locked in her mind, even though her hands burned with the strain.

No word had come from the Children’s Hospital in Denver, where the police chief said they’d taken Cody, or from the hospital that had Aaron. Waiting to hear anything at all made a hollow in her stomach. She heaved a new block of clay to the table, wedged and added it to the mound already softened. Just as she started to climb the stepstool, her phone rang. She plunged her hands into the water bucket and swabbed
them with a towel, silently begging for good news. “Aaron?”

Not her brother, but a nurse calling. “Mr. Reeve asked me to let you know he came through surgery just fine. He’s stable, and the prognosis is optimistic. He doesn’t want you to worry.”

Natalie pressed her palm to her chest with relief. “Did he say anything about Cody? Is there any news?”

“No, he didn’t say. I’m sure he’ll let you know as soon as he hears something.”

“Of course. Thank you so much for calling.”

Natalie climbed back onto the stool, weary but unable to stop. Normally, the face was enough, but this required more. She molded clay over stiff wire-mesh, drawing it up, up, proportionately taller than an average man, shoulders that bore the weight of other people’s fear, one arm wielding a stone, the other enfolding the little one. The rescuer hadn’t held both at once, but she combined the actions to release both images.

She had stared hard at his face for only a moment before he plunged over the ridge, yet retained every line and plane of it. Determination and fortitude in the cut of his mouth, selfless courage in the eyes. There’d been fear for Cody. And himself ? Not of the situation, but something…

It came through her hands in the twist of his brow. A heroic face, aware of the danger, capable of failing, unwilling to hold back. Using fingers and tools, she moved the powerful images trapped by her eidetic memory through her hands to the clay, creating an exterior storage that freed her mind, and immortalizing him—whoever he was. The Summit bar was packed and buzzing, the rescue already playing on televisions visible from every corner. With the whole crowd toasting and congratulating him, Jaz played nice—until he accepted her ride home and infuriated her all over again by not inviting her in.

He’d believed that dating women whose self-esteem reached egotistical meant parting ways wouldn’t faze them. Jaz destroyed that theory. She was not only embittered but vindictive. After turning on the jets, Trevor sank into his spa, letting the water beat his lower- and mid-lumbar muscles.

He pressed the remote to open the horizontal blinds and to look out through the loft windows.

Wincing, he reached in and rubbed the side of his knee. That plunge down the slope had cost him, but, given the outcome, he didn’t consider it a judgment error. That honor went to putting himself once more at the top of Jaz’s hate list. He maneuvered his knee into the pressure of a jet. When he got out, he’d ice it. If he got out.

He closed his eyes and pictured the battered toddler. The crowd’s attention had kept the thoughts at bay, easy to talk about the cat, how mountain lions rarely attacked people, how he and Whit had scared it off, how DOW would euthanize if they caught it, how his only priority had been to get the child. He had segued into the business he and Whit had opened the previous spring, rock and ice climbing, land and water excursions, cross-country ski and snowshoe when the season turned.

That was his business, but rescuing was in his blood, had been since his dad made him the man of the house by not coming home one night or any thereafter. At first, the nightmares had been bad—all the things that could go wrong: fire, snakes, tarantulas, tornadoes. They had populated his dreams until he woke drenched in sweat, cursing his father for trusting him to do what a grown man couldn’t.

The phone rang. He sloshed his arm up, dried his hand on the towel lying beside it, and answered. “Hey, Whit.”

“You doing okay?”

“Knee hurts. You?”

“Oh sure. You know—”

“Hold on. There’s someone at the door.”

“Yeah. Me and Sara.”

Trevor said, “Cute. Where’s your key?”

“Forgot it.”

Gingerly, he climbed over the side, then wrapped a towel around his hips, and let them in.

“You mind?” Whit frowned at the towel, although Sara hadn’t batted an eye.

She came in and made herself at home. Whit carried their twomonth- old asleep in his car seat to a resting place. Trevor threw on Under Armour shorts and a clean T-shirt, then rejoined them. “So what’s up?”

“Nice try, Trevor.” Sara fixed him with a look. “I especially like the practiced nonchalance.”

He grinned. “Hey, I’ve got it down.”

“With Jaz, maybe. No claw marks?”

“Too public.”

Whit rubbed his wife’s shoulder. “We knew you’d worry this thing, so Sara brought the remedy.”

She drew the Monopoly box out of her oversize bag with a grin that said she intended to win and would, wearing them down with her wheeling and dealing. “I’ll take that silly railroad off your hands. It’s no good to you when I have the other three.”

He rubbed his hands, looking into her bold blue eyes. “Bring it.”

The mindless activity and their chatter lightened his mood as Sara had intended. She knew him as well as Whit, maybe better. Each time he caught the concern, he reassured her with a smile. He’d be fine.

Whit played his get-out-of-jail card and freed his cannon. “Hear what’s going in next door to us?”

“No.”

“An art gallery.”

“Yeah?” Trevor adjusted the ice pack on his knee.

“Place called Nature Waits.”

“Waits for what?”

Whit shrugged. “Have to ask the lady sculptor.”

“Won’t exactly draw for our kind of customer.”

“At least it won’t compete.” Sara rolled the dice and moved her pewter shoe. “Another outfitter could have gone in. I’ll buy Park Place.”

Both men mouthed, “I’ll buy Park Place.”

She shot them a smile.

Two hours later, she had bankrupted them with her thoughtful loans and exorbitant use of hotels on prime properties. He closed the door behind them, and it hit. He raised the toilet seat and threw up, then pressed his back to the wall and rested his head, breathing deeply. The shaking returned, and this time he couldn’t blame adrenaline. He had literally puffed the life back into that tiny body. If that child had died in his arms…

Midst came their mighty Paramount, and seemed
Alone th’ antagonist of Heaven, nor less
Than Hell’s dread Emperor, with pomp supreme,
And god-like imitated state.

Child snatched from lion’s jaws. Two-year-old spared in deadly attack. Rescuer Trevor MacDaniel, champion of innocents, protector of life. Cameras rolling, flashes flashing, earnest newscasters recounted the tale. “On this mountain, a miracle. What could have been a tragedy became a triumph through the courage of this man who challenged a mountain lion to save a toddler attacked while hiking with his father, center-fielder…”

He consumed the story in drunken drafts. Eyes swimming, he gazed upon the noble face, the commanding figure on the TV screen. In that chest beat valiance. In those hands lay salvation. His heart made a slow drum in his ears. A spark ignited, purpose quickening.

Years he’d waited. He spread his own marred hands, instruments of instruction, of destruction. With slow deliberation, he closed them into fists. What use was darkness if not to try the light?

It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old…or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!

You never know when I might play a wild card on you!

and the book:

The Canary List

WaterBrook Press (June 21, 2011)

***Special thanks to Lynette Kittle, Senior Publicist, WaterBrook Multnomah, a Division of Random House for sending me a review copy.***

Sigmund Brouwer is the bestselling author of Broken Angel and nineteen other novels, with close to three million books in print. His work has appeared in Time, The Tennessean, on Good Morning America and other media. Sigmund is married to recording artist Cindy Morgan and has two young daughters.

Visit the author’s website.

Best-selling author Sigmund Brouwer of Broken Angel, releases another suspense thriller in The Canary List (WaterBrook Press, June 21, 2011).

Jaimie is just a twelve year-old girl, bumped around between foster homes and relegated to school classes for challenged kids, those lagging in their test scores or with behavioral issues. But her real problem is that she can sense something the other kids can’t—something dark. Something compelling her to run for her life.

And all Crockett Grey wants is to mark the anniversary of his daughter’s death alone.

But when his student Jaimie comes to him terrified, her need for protection collides with his grief, initiating a tangled web of bizarre events that sends them both spiraling toward destruction.

Crockett’s one hope of getting his life back is to uncover the mysterious secrets of Jaimie’s past and her strange gift. It isn’t long before his discoveries lead him to a darker conspiracy, secrets guarded by the highest seat of power in the world—the Vatican.

Product Details:

List Price: $13.99
Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: WaterBrook Press (June 21, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0307446468
ISBN-13: 978-0307446466

ISLAND BREEZES

The Canary List can scare you.  It’s not the adrenalin rush kind of scary.  It’s knowing that the foundational premises of this novel are based on documented research.

I’m wondering just how much can blow you away.  You’re also going to be wondering just what is the Canary List.  You won’t find out what this list is all about until nearly the end.

And when this book gets ever closer to the end, you think you know the truth.  But do you really?

I certainly like suspense.  This one didn’t leave me disappointed.

AND NOW…THE FIRST CHAPTER:

She knew that they hurt the boy, because he told her, always, the mornings after he was returned.

She was the only one the boy trusted. She was five and he was four. Each time he was returned to the house, it seemed he had grown smaller.

Black walls and candles, he said. Hoods and robes, like the scary people in Scooby Doo cartoons. Except it wasn’t a cartoon. He couldn’t describe what the people in hoods and robes did to him because he would start shaking and sobbing as he made the attempt.

He told her it must be something they ate that made them so mean to him. Hales.

She didn’t know what hales were and neither did he. But he told her about two pieces of wood crossed, and how they trampled it and kept repeating about the hales they had ate in, but he never knew what they ate the hales in, because they never finished explaining. They just said ‘hales ate in’ and left it at that.

On the last night she saw the boy, she was in his bedroom at the foster home. They heard the car drive up and looked out the window and saw it was
them again. She had his toy bow and arrow set, and she vowed to the boy that she wouldn’t let them take him again.

She was ready when the man in the mask came into the bedroom. She aimed the arrow at the eyes of the tall man, and the rubber suction cup of the
toy arrow hit him squarely in his left eye. He cursed and lifted the mask and rubbed his eye before he realized that she was the one who had fired the arrow,
not the boy. He dropped the mask into place and, with a snort of rage, stepped forward and swept her away with a blow across her face.

“I am The Prince,” he said, as she struggled to her knees. He moved to stand over her. “Bow to me.”

His face. She had seen it before. He was someone she saw at church on Sundays. In a robe at the front, handing out bread to people as they bowed
down in front of him.

She did not want to bow.

Instead she rose in defiance and spit on his leg. He lashed out again, hitting her across the cheek. She tried to scream, but the pain was too great.

Another man in another mask stepped into the bedroom and pulled him away. Then they took the boy.

She never saw the boy again. He went to live at another house, the people at the house said.

But the man with the mask came back. He wore the mask while he hurt her again. In horrible ways. He promised if she told anyone, he could come
back and kill her and then kill the people of the house.

So she didn’t tell anyone. She tried to believe it was a dream. A very bad dream.

But some nights she would wake up and shiver and cry and wonder where the boy was. And she would wonder, too, what hales were and what they ate the hales in and how it was that hales could make people so horrible.

Chapter 1

Evil hunted her.

It had driven her toward the beach, where, protected by the dark of night, Jaimie Piper crept toward the front window of a small bungalow a few
blocks off the ocean in Santa Monica.

She knew it was wrong, sneaking up on her schoolteacher like this, but she couldn’t help herself. She was afraid—really afraid—and she wanted his help.

First she had to make sure he was alone. If he was with someone else, she wouldn’t bother him.

The sound of night bugs was louder than the traffic on the main boulevard that intersected this quiet street. It was June, and the air was warm and
had the tangy smell of ocean. The grass was cool and wet. She felt the dew soaking through her canvas high-top Converse sneakers. Jaimie wasn’t one to
worry about fashion. She just liked the way the sneakers felt and looked. Okay, maybe she liked them too because none of the other kids her age wore them.

Jaimie was twelve. Slender and tall, she had long, fine hair that she tended to wear in a ponytail with a ball cap. If she let it hang loose, it softened her appearance to the point where others viewed her as girlie, something she hated.

The alternative was to cut it herself, because her foster parents didn’t like wasting money by sending her to a beauty salon, but cutting it herself would just remind her that she was nothing but a foster kid, so she just let it grow. And wore Converse sneakers that looked anything but girlie.

Not only was it wrong to be sneaking up on her teacher’s house, but it was wrong even to know where he lived. Jaimie knew that. But his wallet had been open on his desk once, with his driver’s license showing behind a clear plastic window, and she’d read it upside down while she was talking to him and had memorized his address.

Although this was the first time she’d stopped, she had ridden her bike past his house plenty of times, wondering what it would be like if she lived in
the little house near the beach.

It wasn’t the house that drew her. It was dreaming about what it would be like to have a family, and it seemed the perfect house for a family with a mom and a dad and a couple of girls.

A real family. A house that they had lived in for years and years, with a yard and a couple of dogs. Beagles. She loved beagles.

Her mom would be a little pudgy but someone who laughed all the time. Jaimie didn’t like the moms she saw who were cool and hip and trying to outdo their daughters in skinniness and tight-fitting jeans.

Her dad would not have perfect hair and drive a BMW. Jaimie didn’t have friends, because Jaimie wasn’t a friend kind of person, but she knew girls at
school with dads like that, and those girls didn’t seem happy. If Jaimie had a dad, he’d be the kind of guy who went to barbers, not stylists, and had hair that
was always a couple of weeks past needing a barber, who wore jeans and didn’t tuck in his shirt and always dropped everything to listen to whatever story his
girl wanted to tell him.

A dad like Mr. G, her teacher. He drove an old Jeep, the kind with canvas top and roll bars. Sometimes she’d see a surfboard strapped to the top of it, canvas top gone. Mr. G had that kind of surfer-dude look, with the long hair and a long nose bent a little. Not perfect kind of handsome, but a face you still
looked at twice. Some of the girls in her class had a crush on him.

Not Jaimie.

She just wished she could have a dad like him and a house like the house he lived in. Sometimes when she was really lonely, she would ride her bike in the neighborhood, pretending it was her home and that when she got there, she’d be able to wheel up the sidewalk and drop her bike on the grass and leave
it there, because if it really was her family, no one would get upset about little things like that.

It wasn’t that she just had a good feeling about him. It was that Jaimie knew Mr. G could be trusted. Jaimie had a sense about people, a sense that sometimes haunted her.

Like earlier tonight, when she’d met a guy who had come to her house to talk to her foster parents. She’d watched his eyes as he checked the layout of the
house, standing in the kitchen, saying that he was from Social Services. She had taken her bracelet off to hand wash some dishes, and without it on her
wrist, she’d felt the Evil that radiated from him. Evil that hunted her.

So while the man with Evil was talking to her foster parents, she’d grabbed her bracelet and snuck out of the house and jumped on her bike. Dusk was just turning black when she began the twenty-minute ride from the large old house toward the ocean, where she often snuck at night anyway to walk the beach.

But the feeling of Evil was still so real she couldn’t shake it. She wanted—no, needed—to talk to someone about it. Wanted—no, needed—to feel safe. Somehow.

The one person who had promised to help wasn’t answering her phone. That only left Mr. G. The only other person in the world she could trust.
She made it to the side of the window at his house. She inched her head up to peek through the glass.

She saw a single candle.

And Mr. G on the couch. Holding a big book open in his lap.

She watched, knowing she shouldn’t watch.

It looked like he was talking to the book.

And then he glanced up, and for that split second, it seemed like he was staring right into her eyes.