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!
***Special thanks to Pam Mettler of Zondervan for sending me a review copy.***
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Nancy Rue has written over 100 books for girls, is the editor of the Faithgirlz Bible, and is a popular speaker and radio guest with her expertise in tween and teen issues. She and husband Jim have raised a daughter of their own and now live in Tennessee.
List Price: $9.99
Reading level: Young Adult
Paperback: 224 pages
Publisher: Zondervan (April 16, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0310714842
ISBN-13: 978-0310714842
ISLAND BREEZES
She has some major issues. He calls the girl Crash, and I’m not going to tell you why. You’ll have to read the book to find out.
On top of her ADHS, she has to deal with her bipolar mother while trying to hide both these illnesses from others. Then her “dead” father pops up and she ends up being stuck in Florida with the guy.
During her trip to Florida, she has “the book” thrust upon her by an old geezer in the airport waiting area.
RL once again enters the life of a teen girl trying to deal with life’s issues. I guess I shouldn’t say once again. This book is actually the first in the Real Life series. I read it second, but it really doesn’t make that much difference. Each book stands on it own.
BTW, the pages didn’t flutter for Jessie. If you want to know what that means, you need to read the second book.
Press the browse button to view the first chapter:
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!
***Special thanks to Pam Mettler of Zondervan for sending me a review copy.***
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Nancy Rue has written over 100 books for girls, is the editor of the Faithgirlz Bible, and is a popular speaker and radio guest with her expertise in tween and teen issues. She and husband Jim have raised a daughter of their own and now live in Tennessee.
List Price: $9.99
Reading level: Young Adult
Paperback: 224 pages
Publisher: Zondervan (April 20, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0310714850
ISBN-13: 978-0310714859
ISLAND BREEZES
Oh, man! What a heavy subject. It seems that abusive teen relationships are becoming more common. This subject is handled truthfully and respectfully in this Real Life book.
I was drawn into the story immediately. Of course, a setting in an emergency room will always suck me in right away. It didn’t end there. I just wanted to keep on reading. I shouldn’t have started the book when I was in the midst of preparations proceeding a trip to the mainland.
I’m spending a week with Consumer Man, so I had to force myself to put the book down. Even after I hit the road, I didn’t make it over the bridge before stopping for lunch and another read. It took an hour before I got serious about the drive.
I arrived late after my husband had already left for work. I only partly unloaded the car and didn’t unpack a thing before curling up in his recliner and reading for several hour before falling asleep in the chair. The next thing I knew, he was home and telling me it was bedtime.
Finally, after breakfast we both did the comfy bit and I got to finish the book. I can’t wait until I read the next one. I don’t know why I read the second in the series before the first, but it really doesn’t matter. Each book is about a different girl who ends up with a magical book in her possession.
Yes, magic. I was wishing I had a magic book like Bryn’s. Then I realized I do. You can read about Bryn’s struggle through this abusive relationship and discover her magic book yourself. Just give yourself lots of time. You won’t want to put this book down.
PRESS THE BROWSE BUTTON TO VIEW THE FIRST CHAPTER:
Did you know that Psalm (1 is known as the “Soldiers Psalm”? Neither did I. I’ve read it and have always liked it, but I didn’t really comprehend all that I was reading.
This book takes you through the psalm verse by verse, explaining it in detail. It’s easy to see why this psalm would be claimed by our military men and women.
Included in the book are testimonies of people, both civilian and military, who claimed the promises of this psalm.
I will be buying a bunch of these books for family and friends. Psalm 91 is an excellent way to share God’s love and blessings with others.
Suffering. Why do some of us have to live with it? Why doesn’t God just make it all go away?
A person can suffer in many different ways including physical pain, mental anguish and spiritual torment. This small book can help you understand the purpose for your pain and how to get through it.
As a nurse I’ve seen a lot of suffering. Especially while working as a hospice nurse and now as a mental health nurse. I want to make the suffering go away and at times have wondered why.
Some people bring pain and suffering upon themselves. Others don’t, but still have to endure the pain. Why? To Those Who Sufferhelps bring understanding.
What a very special mailbox! Just who is the Kindred Spirit who guards the mailbox and it’s precious secrets?
This book takes us through both the past and present of two people and the secrets that are shared with the Kindred Spirit. This is a book I didn’t want to put down. I wanted to know what kind of secrets Lindsay and Campbell have.
Will they be able to overcome the heartache of the past? It seems as if it will be very difficult.
Who is the Kindred Spirit? I kept changing my mind about who I thought it might be. You’re going to have to read this for yourself.
You know, don’t you, that this is a real mailbox? I want to go to that beach and experience it for myself. How about you?
This is definitely a yummy book! It takes me back to my grandmother’s when she lived on the farm. This was the first farm. My grandparents later moved into town for a spell before moving back to a different place in the country.
Those days in the country created many memories and lots of good food. Ms Moore knows that and shares some wonderful memories with us. And the food – she shares that as well.
Okay, so she doesn’t share the food. But she does share some wonderful recipes so you can get in the kitchen and find out what good eating is all about. There are so many I want to try out. I take exception to only one recipe.
The blackberry cobbler my grandmother made always had a bottom crust and a top crust. Are we the only ones who make two crusted cobbler?
This book will feed your mind as well as your tummy. After you read it, let me know which recipe is your favorite. I couldn’t find a favorite. I found a bunch of favorites.
Okay, now I’m hungry. A snack and a book is sounding good right now. I think I’ll have to read some more of these recipes that are in Way Back in the Country Garden.
Happy Independence Day. May you be blessed as you celebrate with family and friends today. Here is one of my favorite patriotic recordings. Spend a few minutes really listening to the words.
FIRSTWildCardTours2.jpg”>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!
***Special thanks to Anna Coelho Silva | Publicity Coordinator, Book Group | Strang Communications for sending me a review copy.***
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Peggy Joyce Ruth and her husband, Jack, are former pastors from Brownwood, Texas. Peggy has taught an adult Bible study each week at her church for the past thirty years. She is a popular conference speaker and continues to teach a weekly radio Bible study called Better Living on KPSM and KBUB.
List Price: $14.99
Paperback: 248 pages
Publisher: Charisma House (June 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1616381477
ISBN-13: 978-1616381479
AND NOW…THE FIRST CHAPTER:
WHERE IS MY DWELLING PLACE?
He who dwells in the shelter of the Most HighWill abide in the shadow of the Almighty.
—Psalm 91:1
Have you ever been inside a cabin with a big roaring fire in the fireplace, enjoying a wonderful feeling of safety and security as you watch an enormous electrical storm going
on outside? It is a warm, wonderful sensation, knowing you are being sheltered and protected from the storm. That is what Psalm 91 is all about—shelter!
I am sure you can think of something that represents security to you personally. When I think of security and protection, I have a couple of childhood memories that automatically come to mind. My dad was a large, muscular man who played football during his high school and college years, but he interrupted his education to serve in the military during World War II. Mother, who was pregnant with my little brother, and I lived with my grandparents in San Saba, Texas, while Dad was in the service. As young as I was, I vividly remember one ecstatically happy day when my dad unexpectedly opened the door and walked into my grandmother’s living room. Before that eventful day, I had been tormented with fears because some neighborhood children had told me
I would never see my dad again. Like kids telling a ghost story, they taunted me that my dad would come home in a box. When he walked through that door, a sense of peace and security came over me and stayed with me for the rest of his time in the army.
It was past time for my baby brother to be born, and I found out when I was older that Dad’s outfit at the time was being relocated by train from Long Beach, California, to Virginia Beach, Virginia. The train was coming through Fort Worth, Texas, on its way to Virginia, so my dad caught a ride from Fort Worth to San Saba in the hopes of seeing his new son. He then hitchhiked until he caught up with the train shortly before it reached Virginia Beach. The memory of his walking into that room still brings a feeling of peaceful calm to my soul. In fact, that incident set the stage for later seeking the security a heavenly Father’s presence could bring.
Did you know there is a place in God—a secret place—for those who want to seek refuge? It is a literal place of physical safety and security that God tells us about in Psalm 91.
Dwelling in the shelter of the Most High is the Old Testament’s way of teaching faith. This gives us the most intense illustration of the very essence of a personal relationship with God. Man has no innate built-in shelter. Alone, he stands unsheltered against the elements and must run to the shelter Himself. In the first verse of Psalm 91, God offers us more than protection; it is as if He rolls out the hospitality mat and personally invites us in.
I cannot talk about this kind of peace and security without also having another vivid memory come to mind. My parents once took my younger siblings and me fishing on a lake near Brownwood, Texas, for an afternoon of fun.
Dad had a secluded place where we fished for perch. That was the second greatest highlight of the outing. I loved seeing the cork begin to bob and then suddenly go completely out of sight. There were only a few things that could thrill me more than jerking back on that old, cane pole and landing a huge perch right in the boat. I think I was fully grown before I realized that Dad had an ulterior motive in taking us for an afternoon of perch fishing. He used the perch as bait for the trotline he had stretched out across one of the secret coves at the lake.
Dad would drive the boat over to the place where his trotline was located, cut off the boat motor, and inch the boat across the cove as he ran the trotline. That’s what he called it when he took the trotline into his hands and pulled the boat alongside all the strategically placed, baited hooks to see if any of them had caught a large catfish.
I said that catching the perch was the second greatest highlight of the outing. By far the greatest thrill came when Dad would get to a place where the trotline would begin to jerk almost out of his hand. Then we three siblings would watch, wide-eyed, as Dad wrestled with the line until finally, in victory, he would flip a huge catfish over the side of the boat, right on the floorboard at our feet. Money couldn’t buy that kind of excitement! Not even the circus and a carnival all rolled up into one could compete with that kind of a thrill.
However, one of these outings turned out to be more eventful than most, quickly becoming an experience I will never forget. It had been beautiful when we started out, but by the time we finished our perch fishing and headed toward the cove, everything had changed. A storm came upon the lake so suddenly there was no time to get back to the boat dock. The sky turned black, lightning flashed, and drops of rain fell with such force they actually stung when they hit. Moments later, we were being pelted by marble-sized hailstones.
I saw the fear in my mother’s eyes, and I knew we were in danger. But before I had time to wonder what we were going to do, Dad had driven the boat to the rugged shoreline of the only island on the lake. Although boat docks surround the island now, back then it looked like an abandoned island with absolutely no place to take cover. Within moments Dad had us all out of the boat and ordered the three of us to lie down beside our mother on the ground. He quickly pulled a canvas tarp out of the bottom of the boat, knelt down on the ground beside us, and thrust the tarp up over all five of us. That storm continued to
rage outside the makeshift tent he had fashioned over us—the rain beat down, the lightning flashed, and the thunder rolled. Yet I could think of nothing else but how it felt to have my dad’s arms around us. There was a certain calm under the protection of the shield my father had provided that is hard to explain now. In fact, I had never felt as safe and secure in my entire life. I remember thinking that I wished the storm would last forever. I didn’t want anything to spoil the wonderful security I felt that day in our secret hiding place. Feeling my father’s protective arms around me, I never wanted the moment to end.
Although I have never forgotten that experience, today it has taken on new meaning. Just as Dad put a tarp over us to shield us from the storm, our heavenly Father has a secret place in His arms that protects us from the storms that are raging in the world around us.
That secret place is literal, but it is also conditional! In verse 1 of Psalm 91, God lists our part of the condition before He even mentions the promises included in His part. That’s because our part has to come first. To abide in the shadow of the Almighty, we must first choose to dwell in the shelter of the Most High.
The question is, “How do we dwell in the security and shelter of the Most High?” It is more than an intellectual experience. This verse speaks of a dwelling place in which we can be physically protected if we run to Him. You may utterly believe that God is your refuge, you may give mental assent to it in your prayer time, you may teach Sunday School lessons on this concept of refuge, and you may even get a warm feeling every time you think of it, but unless you do something about it—unless you actually get up and run to the shelter—you will never experience it.
You might call that place of refuge—a love walk! In fact, the secret place is, in reality, the intimacy and familiarity of the presence of God Himself. When our grandchildren Cullen, ten, and Meritt, seven, stay the night with us, the moment they finish breakfast each runs to his own secret place to spend some time talking with God. Cullen finds a
place behind the couch in the den, and Meritt heads behind the lamp table in the corner of our bedroom. Those places have become very special to them.
Where is your secret place? You too need the security and shelter of a secret place with the Most High.
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!
