As a Canadian of Mennonite descent through my mother, I am drawn to books such as CALM Before THE STORM, about the history of events that caused this people group to disperse around the world.
This summer, when we visited relatives in Saskatchewan, my stepson handed me this historical novel and its sequel in a thrift store.
CALM Before THE STORM takes place in the Ukraine, which in 1914, was the Mennonite settlement area that had been granted by Catherine the Great, to farmers from Germany and Holland. She allowed them special privileges in turn for developing the land.
By this time, my own ancestors had already fled from Russia. It was interesting to me to learn how the situation gradually worsened. The special privileges Mennonites had been granted allowed them to prosper, while the Russian citizens remained oppressed.
I’m grateful that my own ancestors foresaw the dangers and came to Canada early on. Unrest brews in this story. Yet I can see why many were reluctant to leave, with ties to family members who were unable to travel.
Mennonites, as a whole, took a stance of non-violence. So, while most of them didn’t take up arms, they participated in the war as medics.
I particularly liked the last chapters, in which one of the main characters invites weary soldiers into her home and feeds them.
I look forward to reading the next book in the series.
Learn more about this book and others by Janice L. Dick at:
Horses, women’s rights, love and marriage in 1905 America.
Horses, women’s rights, love and marriage in 1905 America. A young woman and her horse. Family expectations, loyalties, needs and desires. Secrets brought to light.
the SECRETS of EMBERWILD
What will become of Nora and her dearly loved horse now that her father has died? Her uncle takes charge, but something doesn’t seem right.
At the same time, Silas turns up, asking questions about his father’s death 15 years ago and the horse that went missing.
A series of suspicious accidents occur. Something is wrong, but what is really going on, and why? And who is the culprit?
In 1905, women’s roles and men’s roles were distinct. Men took care of horses. Women cooked and kept the house. But Nora’s horse is all she loves.
Bringing history to life
Horses, women’s rights, love and marriage in 1905 America. Stephania McGee brings to life the difficulties of an independent woman of the era. It wasn’t easy to step out and make choices. Women were expected to obey and fit into the lives cut out for them. Nora had to consider her mother, the reputation of her family, and her own needs for protection and provision. But what about the needs of her heart?
McGee has put a lot of research into the writing of this novel. We learn about horses and racing at the time, as well as the lives people lived. I particularly enjoyed the way she describes places, horses and people. The mystery combined with threads of romance is reminiscent of Agatha Christie’s style, with the real culprit revealed at the end.
Thank you, Revell, for sending me a beautiful copy of this book to review. I’m glad I chose it. I recommend it to horse lovers and readers of historical women’s fiction.
This book can be purchased at Chapters.indigo.ca, by clicking here.
A snapshot of lives and changes with the onset of World War II, this story begins in 1939 in Washington DC. Liane is married to Armand, an older French Ambassador whose first wife passed away. They love each other deeply, and have two young daughters.
Armand is transferred back to Paris, and the family accompanies him. Liane meets Nick, owner of Burnham Steel, and his wife and son, while crossing the Atlantic on a luxury ship. His son befriends her daughters, and Nick and Liane keep each other company. Armand has work to do even on the ship, and Nick’s unfaithful wife goes off partying with new friends.
Peace for Now
In 1939 people wonder whether the war might impact France. For the time being, at least in Paris, there is still peace. For those in high society, dinners and dances and other social activities continue on as before. Armand works long hours and shares less and less about it with Liane. She is lonely, but doesn’t complain.
When Armand sees that the war is coming to France, he wants to send Liane and the girls back to the States, but Liane insists on staying and supporting him. Although he’s busy working long days and no longer shares anything about it with her, at least he comes home for a few hours at night.
The Last Freighter Home
Nick’s wife and son return to the States, where she is involved with another man. Liane has not seen Nick, but finally, when Armand puts her and the girls on the last freighter bound for home, there’s Nick again, on the same boat. Together they work to save the lives of hundreds of men from a ship that was bombed. And find themselves irresistibly attracted to one another.
What will they do? Both are dedicated to their spouses and children, even though Nick’s marriage is hopeless and Liane’s husband is immersed in his work. She cannot tell anyone that s a Armand is a double agent, and he cannot share anything much about it to her.
Back in Washington DC, Armand is seen as a traitor by their former friends. Liane and her daughters move to San Francisco to live with her uncle.
Nick tries unsuccessfully to get his wife and son back. Life is depressing and frustrating for him. Eventually he re-enlists in the navy. Before I give away any more spoilers, I’ll stop here.
A snapshot of lives and changes during the onset of WW II, this historical fiction shows the heart-wrenching struggles that some families faced.
Writing Style
Written forty years ago, Danielle Steel used an older form of narration. Currently most novels are written from the “Point of View” of one character at a time in each scene. But this story is written from an “Omniscient” POV. The author sees through the eyes of several characters in each scene. As an older person myself, I grew up reading books in this style and I don’t mind it. When I started writing a novel myself seven years ago, I had to unlearn this writing style. But there is much I still learn from her writing, such as how to include emotional tension, and the amount of work she must have put into research.
Thank you to my son for picking up this book for me from a Little Lending Library, which Nanaimo has many of around town. You can put your used books there for someone else, and find some for yourself to read.
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A Dance in Donegal transported me from Canada in 2021 to a village on the west coast of Ireland in 1921. I haven’t quite returned home yet. If I really went there and encountered all that this main character did, I doubt I would fare as well as her, though. She was transported from Boston, alone in the unknown.
Vivid Contrasts
A young American woman moves to her mother’s hometown in Ireland.
My thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy of this book to review. I chose it out of the several they published this month because it’s based in Ireland. Two of my great-grandparents were Irish and I’m curious about their land and lives. I wonder if they came from villages like this. Thank you to the author for painting a vivid word-picture. You showed us the setting and the interactions of villagers, good and bad. Simple and poor living conditions, generosity, gossip, lies, loyalty, betrayal, sickness, superstition, hatred and love. Most of all, the miracle of God’s love, which changes lives. You even gave us tastes of the language, integrated in phrases.
Tea and brown bread seem to be mainstays. I wonder whether it’s the same brown bread we eat nowadays here in North America, made with yeast. Perhaps they used a quicker molasses and soda recipe.
Writing Style
Chapters are short; nice for me as I read in between doing other things. The pace is comfortable. I like how the author gets into the heads and hearts of the main characters. Readers can almost feel their emotions with them. However, some of the physical emotive description seemed overdone to me. I couldn’t relate to tears splashing onto my breast, or bile in my throat as a reaction.
I’m glad the main character survived her first few months. At the end, somehow it seemed like a beginning from which the story could continue. Maybe there will be a sequel.
To learn more about the author and upcoming books, go to JENNIFERDEIBEL.COM.
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Something Worth Doing is a historical fiction based on the real life story of Abigail Duniway. The novel covers the years from 1852 to 1912, from when Abigail was seventeen to when she was seventy-seven. Chapter one begins with Abigail’s family travelling west by wagon train from Illinois. Her mother has recently passed away. Abigail (or Jenny, as was her nickname), felt that the move may have contributed to her mother’s early death. Men ruled in those days. Women had very little choice about anything. So, although her mother, after bearing a series of children, wished to remain in Illinois where “civilization was catching up to them”, her father had said no. He also forbid his daughters to bring anything that they treasured, however they found ways of hiding some of their mother’s possessions to sneak along.
Girls were expected to marry young, to be under the protection of a husband. Marriage had little to do with love. An older sister was forced to marry a man 20 years her senior. Abigail was fortunate to marry a man who did love her. However, she felt that she had no freedoms and a heavy workload, while he was able to enjoy time with his friends. Men had all the rights and women had none. Abigail felt it keenly and saw it clearly. She began to write articles for the paper highlighting the unfairness of it all. Then she wrote a novel to portray her concerns. But people were not reading novels at that time.
Abigail continually found ways to supplement the family income throughout her childbearing years, and her work was always in some way for the betterment of women. She eventually got involved in the suffragette movement, especially concentrating on pushing for womens voting rights. With the assistance of her family she even started up a newspaper, and later toured the country speaking.
After many years some regions gradually changed, but she met with continual opposition, even from an older brother who published a bigger newspaper. Finally, at the age of 77, she saw success and honour, even from that brother.
Persistence pays off is the message I take away from this story. Dont quit. Keep working at “something worth doing”, the worthy cause that has been handed to you.
Do orphan stories tug at your heartstrings? This one is set in 1870s Tennessee, at a time when epidemics of fever swept through remote mountain homesteads, leaving orphans to fend for themselves.
Worie suddenly found herself in this position at the age of 17. Considered a grown woman in the day, she took on responsibility for a string of younger orphans that kept coming to her for help. Unbeknown to Worie, her mother had been bringing food to them before she died.
Though homes were far apart, neighbours knew each other and helped each other. They didn’t have much, but they made do.
Guns were part of life here too, and Worie’s mother had shot herself, for no apparent reason. No sooner had she buried her mother with the help of a neighbour, than one of her older brothers showed up demanding their mother’s treasure, hidden in a jar. Worie chased him off at gunpoint. And this is just the beginning of this adventure-filled story.
Written in first person, using vernacular throughout, Sproles shows us Worie’s life through her own eyes. Her mother’s legacy was truths she learned from the Bible. Initially angry at God, Worie gradually fell back on her mother’s wisdom.
Through this work of fiction, Sproles addresses some of the universal questions of life and death, good and evil. Worie finds peace in God, and forgiveness and purpose.
I cried at the end, and that doesn’t happen often. It’s not all sad though; people find joy in one another in the midst of hardship, danger and injustice, which is the way life should be.
I received this book from the publisher in exchange for a review, and I chose this one because I like historical fiction with some romance to give it spice. Speaking of which, the main character in this novel is a cook, so you can pick up a few cooking tips from her!
Out of the Embers
Although it is Book One of a series, it reads well as a stand-alone too, as all the strings are tied up at the end. The author tells you what Book Two will be about and includes the first chapter. The focus will shift onto different characters in the same town.
Out of the Embers starts with Evelyn, a young woman who works in an orphanage in 1855, with Polly, a recently orphaned little girl. They are returning to the orphanage with the horse and wagon when they discover that the orphanage has been burned to the ground and there are no survivors.
Fleeing to get away from whoever did this, they end up in a pretty ranch town at the foot of a mountain. A handsome cowboy finds them caught in a thunderstorm and invites them to his home where his mother and sister insist that they stay.
Evelyn and Polly settle in happily to Mesquite Springs but there is always this underlying fear that somebody is after them. Indeed it’s true! More than one person is after them! But I’m not giving away any spoilers, so you’ll just have to read it yourself to find out!
My son gave me this book for Christmas because I read several John Grisham books in the past which I liked. What makes his books interesting to me is that because he is a lawyer, he includes a lot of insight in his novels about the way the American law system works (or fails!). As a person who grew up in a very safe environment, I was quite naĂŻve and overly trusting of those in authority.
Grisham’s novels are really an eye-opener!
This novel is based in 1940s America, as well as in the Philippines where one of the main characters fought in the second world war. It presents a picture of the times and the ways that different types of people were affected by circumstances.
The story revolves around a multigenerational family living on a cotton plantation outside of a small town. They have black people working for them, who live on the farm. Unlike some, they treat their workers comparatively well. However, at the time blacks did not have the same legal rights as white people in the States.
Also many people were very religious. In this town most of the people are members of a few different protestant churches. Grisham brings out some of their differences, similarities and hypocrisies. In general, the people of this town are quite strait-laced and narrow in their views of right and wrong. However the mother of this family is from a big city and is considerably more worldly. Over time she becomes accustomed to the church of the family she married into, mostly because it affords the only social life available to her.
Her husband is drafted into the war and after several months the family receives the news that he is missing and presumed dead. This causes great grief, but they carry on with life. Meanwhile, he has not actually died, and a large section of the book goes into details of the war experiences that he went through. Horrible as it was, he came through a victor and a hero against all odds.
When he shows up suddenly back home, the family is overjoyed, but this doesn’t last long. Inexplicably the mother ends up in a mental institution, and the father goes into town and shoots their pastor in his church office! These things happen while the son and daughter are away at college. The son is studying to become a lawyer and gets involved with the family’s lawyers in the mystery of the case, which is drawn out over several years. You will have to read it yourself to find out the results! In the end it’s not what you think!
This Christmas novella is set in Stirling, Scotland, in 1894. Â It’s a romance with a different twist. The main story takes place over a period of only three days, from Christmas Eve to Boxing Day, with flashbacks to an incident that occured twelve years previously. Â The author has done her research and it’s interesting to enter into this time and place through the experiences of the characters. Â The main protagonist is a young woman in her 20s who lives away from her family, considered quite independant for those days.
There is a train accident because of a heavy snowfall, through which she gets to know a handsome redheaded man with a terrible secret. Â He wants to be forgiven, but is it possible?
Themes of honesty versus hiding truth, and how holding onto grudges ruins lives emerge. Â Everyone feels bad for the crippled younger brother, but does he deserve their pity?
Liz Curtis Higgs likes to travel to Scotland to do her research and has posted photos she took in Stirling at www.Facebook.com/MyScottishHeart.Â
