Linda Goodnight

3.5 stars (rating shown may differ depending on site).

A friend (MH) sent me this book.

Sage's coping mechanism for years has been to run away, so little wonder that she grabs her niece and nephew and runs away. I understand the run away before they hurt you or abandon you mentality.

Bowie's and Sage's history makes the pace of their relationship more believable. Their histories also make their understanding of Paisley and Ryder work.

I liked learning a little about leather working through Bowie. I liked Ms. Bea having a gathering place (bakery) where many ages felt comfortable and safe and being concerned about leaving her town with no other place like that.… (mer)

This book is on sale in the Kindle store this month, and I enjoyed the sample, so I scooped it up. It's pretty much exactly what it says on the tin: Annalisa Keller is running for her life after being assaulted by her boyfriend on a deserted road near the infamous Whisper Falls, Arkansas. The story of the falls is that if you pray behind the waterfall, God will answer your prayers, and she is certainly praying for assistance: battered, bruised, and with a broken arm, she needs all the help she can get.

The falls skirt Austin Blackwell's land, and he spotted her as she was tripping through the mountains. He's concerned because of her obviously broken arm and goes after her. He hauls her into town to the doctor, pays for her pain meds, and takes her back to the ranch he shares with his sister, Cassie. Annalisa hides in shame and tries to lie to him about what happened, but he isn't buying it. After a few days, she tells him what happened, but she also tells him that she's not going to rely on him to sort things out for her. She wants to start her life over, and Whisper Falls is as good a place as any to do it.

Austin wouldn't really know. He's made a recluse of himself on his ranch, and with good reason: there's a pretty ugly secret from his past that he's running from, one that no one but his sister knows about. He's determined to hide in his own shame, and does it for most of the story. It's a pretty spectacular secret; the author pulls no punches there, I have to give her credit for that.

The inevitable happens: Annalisa and Austin live in fear of her ex coming back, which he eventually does. It turns into a showdown with the town, and it's a fairly decent climax to the story. A bit dramatic, but everyone's secrets come pouring out, and both Austin and Annalisa learn what real love is, both romantic and familial, as the townspeople absorb their backgrounds and stand with them anyway.

The romance was quiet and sweet, and I enjoyed Austin and Annalisa's journey towards each other and facing their respective pasts. The "God stuff" was laid on a little too thick for my tastes, but I knew what I was coming in for with a LoveInspired novel, so no surprises. I do appreciate that the two don't immediately tie the knot at the end (having known each other for less than a year after a three-month jump in the epilogue), but the author also shoves in a long-lost family reunion at literally the last second that was completely unbelievable. Maybe it would've fit if the book wasn't category length, but it just stuck out like a sore thumb to me.

This was more of a library-level of enjoyment than a bought-book level of enjoyment for me. I'm curious about the rest of the series, as I did enjoy the townsfolk (very small town/women's-fiction-y vibe in that sense), but I don't think I'll be buying any more of the books.… (mer)

This is book 3 and once again I didn’t read book 1 and it didn’t matter because even though there are references to past circumstances, it still reads as a stand-alone story. The novel takes place in two time periods, current day at the Peach Tree Inn, and later on in 1875 at the Peach Tree Farm which is the same property. In the current time Grayson Blake has come home to Tennessee to buy the old gristmill across from the Peach Tree Inn and make it into a restaurant. He and his brother Devlin are staying at the Inn while the work starts at the mill. As soon as he arrives he sees that one of the Inn’s owners is his childhood crush Valery Carter, a former ballet dancer who he thought had found fame and success in New York. Although Grayson still feels attracted to Valery they are complete opposites, he is all business all the time and she is a party girl with lots of admirers, or so it seems outwardly; but both have secrets and baggage from the past. As much as their relationship doesn’t stand a chance, it also looks like the mill project won’t be happening either when they unearth a skeleton buried in the basement. There are a lot of civil war artifacts found at the Mill and the Inn and that leads us to the other time period with Ben and Tandy and more characters that drew me into their lives. This author did a great job pulling all the stories together and each character adds so much that I felt attached to them emotionally, wanting the best for them and fearing the worst. I now need to read from the beginning and just picked up The Memory House which is book 1.… (mer)