Personal Rating: 3.75 Stars Goodreads Rating: 4.13 Nearly eighteen, Molly Ayer knows she has one last chance. Just months from "aging out" of the child welfare system, and close to being kicked out of her foster home, a community service position helping an elderly woman clean out her home is the only thing keeping her out of juvie and worse. Vivian Daly has lived a quiet life on the coast of Maine. But in her attic, hidden in trunks, are vestiges of a turbulent past. As she helps Vivian sort through her possessions and memories, Molly discovers that she and Vivian aren't as different as they seem to be. A young Irish immigrant orphaned in New York City, Vivian was put on a train to the Midwest with hundreds of other children whose destinies would be determined by luck and chance. The closer Molly grows to Vivian, the more she discovers parallels to her own life. A Penobscot Indian, she, too, is an outsider being raised by strangers, and she, too, has unanswered questions about the past. As her emotional barriers begin to crumble, Molly discovers that she has the power to help Vivian find answers to mysteries that have haunted her for her entire life - answers that will ultimately free them both. (goodreads.com) As much as I adore those Little Free Libraries I had never actually taken a book from one. One of the book boxes near me was getting kind of full (stuffed with these crumbling old Westerns and a few odds and ends) so I decided to take one. No, I’d never heard of this one before and I didn’t really have any idea what it was about, but I liked the cover so I grabbed it. What an emotional roller coaster of a book! Goodness, there were so many sad parts. But I love the characters and the story. It was a great read. The main characters, Molly and Vivian, were interesting. I started out wanting to hear Molly’s story only and not caring about the historical drama taking place in the late 1920’s and 1930’s. However, the writing was so good that by the end of it I was totally invested in both character’s lives and the similarities between them. Though, I might have liked the parts with Vivian a bit more by the end. The plot was fantastically woven, though to a person who is used to reading stories about teenagers overthrowing governments it seemed a little boring at first. If you really want to enjoy this book then you have to be ready for a bit of slowness now and then, between the emotionally charged parts. It was an endearing and historically accurate story of a girl, torn from everything she knows first as an immigrant and then as a child on an orphan train. The historical aspects were particularly interesting to me, partially because of the time they took place in. I would have expected a story like this to be a few decades earlier in history and it was interesting to see it happening in the late twenties and to learn about how the orphan trains and the adoptions afterward really worked. I like a bit of learning in my reading from time to time and this book was fascinating. While it was not a book that stood out in any particular way or really blew me away, I did enjoy it and I found it to be an interesting read. It seems like the kind of book you might read for a literature class or for a book club full of people who read much more meaningful works than I do on a regular basis. You know those book clubs, the ones that are welcoming to everyone and read thought provoking books that you never actually thought you’d read, but you ended up liking? I’ve never been to one of those book clubs or any book club really. Come to think of it, I might like to start one someday. It would be a good way to socialize and talk about books. Note to self: consider book club. Anywho, I really did enjoy this read and I do recommend it. However, I feel that I ought to mention that there is a descriptive scene of a child getting molested. There are not many other negative aspects that I can think of in the book, but that was a big one that really shocked me. I was at Barnes and Noble the other day and I saw a slightly different version of this same book in the children’s section. I’m assuming that someone saw that the rest of the book was suitable for children and removed that and other violent or mature parts from the book so you might try looking into that as an option if you want to read this book. TTFN! Image source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15818107-orphan-train?ac=1&from_search=true
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Personal Rating: 2.5 Stars Goodreads Rating: 4.11 Stars Lady Sabine is harboring a skin blemish, one, that if revealed, could cause her to be branded as a witch, put her life in danger, and damage her chances of making a good marriage. After all, what nobleman would want to marry a woman so flawed? Sir Bennet is returning home to protect his family from an imminent attack by neighboring lords who seek repayment of debts. Without fortune or means to pay those debts, Sir Bennet realizes his only option is to make a marriage match with a wealthy noblewoman. As a man of honor, he loathes the idea of courting a woman for her money, but with time running out for his family’s safety, what other choice does he have? As Lady Sabine and Sir Bennet are thrust together under dangerous circumstances, will they both be able to learn to trust each other enough to share their deepest secrets? Or will those secrets ultimately lead to their demise? (goodreads.com) If you recall all the way back to July of 2016, my very first book review was for a novel by the name of An Uncertain Choice. I did that review because I had won an ARC of the sequel to that book (A Daring Sacrifice) in a Goodreads Giveaway and wanted to review both. The third book in that series finally came out last year and I have read it. And because I reviewed the first two I thought I’d better keep up the tradition and review the last one as well. As much as I love reading the cheesy love stories and pious adventures that occur in Christian young adult novels, I do understand when a book is actually good or not. Full disclosure: I enjoyed reading this book. I often have a good time rolling my eyes at less than realistic romance and just downright cardboard characters, I like reading this kind of book. However, I acknowledge the fact that this book was, frankly, not very good. If you don’t get down to the details then this book has pretty much the same plot as the first two. Or at least it felt the same. There’s a noblewoman who has a problem that she cannot trust anyone to help her with. There’s a nobleman/knight who also has a big problem. When they meet they second guess their love for each other for pages on end until they have a climactic problem that forces them to realize how much they actually do love each other. Happily ever after, the end. Meh! And the characters are always kind of blergh as well. Sir Bennet was in the first book of this series and I remember him having a bit of a personality there, but it seems to have vanished in this book. He’s just your average charming knight with a “perfectly sculpted nose” (that’s a direct quote). I felt like his personality was kind of parroting the heroine’s personality. Speaking of the female protagonist, Lady Sabine, she actually had a unique personality! That was a lovely, change from Lady Rosemarie in the first book and the stereotypical “strong woman” that we saw in Lady Juliana. Sabine actually said some witty things and could even be funny at times. It was sad to see her vibrant character squashed by Sir Bennet behaving in exactly the same way as she did, just more masculinely. Once again, we see a complete lack of interesting side characters apart from Sabine’s grandmother, who was a tricky lady who seems like she should have a book of her own - and not about when she was young either. I want a book about Sabine’s granny as a granny. I don’t know why, but I do. Sadly, the rest of the non-protagonist characters were mostly just there as plot devices and fillers. Not very interesting, not remarkable, just props. The series is called “An Uncertain Choice” after the first book, but that name kind of does fit all three novels. Every single chapter was filled with the guy and the girl being uncertain about whether or not they loved each other. They just kept thinking about it and nothing else. Every decision they made in their day-to-day lives made them think of each other for some reason and thinking of each other made them question whether the other person loved them or if they loved the other person. Over and over and over again. Nonstop uncertainty. To sum up this brief review: there isn’t much new material here. It is very much what I picture when I think of “YA Christian Fiction” in every way. Unrealistic romance (Sir Bennet was way too romantic to be real, I mean, the guy is supposed to be running a castle and it seems like all he ever has on his mind is Sabine - then again, I’ve never experienced any romance so maybe that’s what it’s like? idk), simple a predictable plot, mostly boring characters with no development, and a nicely wrapped up ending. But that didn’t stop me from enjoying it. If you read it I hope you find some enjoyment in it too, whether it be from actually liking the book or because you thought the cheesiness was entertaining. It is relatively short and not a bad way to spend your afternoon. Just be warned that toward the end there is quite a bit of smooching. Oh dear! My castle is under siege! I’d best go defend it! Fare thee well! Image source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30649325-for-love-and-honor |
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