"Sitka" by Louis L'Amour

Basically, Sitka is an origin story for the state of Alaska.

I'm not even joking.

Jean LaBarge grows up in the swamps of Pennsylvania before heading off into the wilderness and ending up a young man on the California coast.  He spends a lot of time on sailing ships.  He gets big and tough and true-hearted, like all the best L'Amour heroes.  He keeps in touch with his childhood best friend, who stays in the East and becomes an important politician.

And he obsesses over Alaska.

Now, having been obsessed with Alaska myself since I was 11 years old, I understand that last bit.  There's something kind of magical about even just the name.  Alaska.  

I actually bought my copy of this book while in Alaska last August.  (I bought it in Skagway, not Sitka, but that doesn't matter.)  It took me thirty-four years to get there -- quite a bit longer than it takes Jean LaBarge.  He gets there while it still belongs to Russia and helps to open up to the possibility of Russia selling it to the United States.  He also spends several months crossing Russia from the Pacific to the Atlantic.  He falls in love with a Russian princess, with a sort of classic Medieval courtly love, since she's already married to a really great guy.  He makes enemies and defeats them.  Lots of really exciting stuff happens in the best style of L'Amour's sweeping epics.

It took me six months to read the first 60 pages of this book, and three days to read the last 250.  Make of that whatever you want.

Particularly Good Bits:

It gleamed there on his calloused palm, heavy as sin in the heart of a man.  "If that isn't gold, what is it?" (p. 55).

To a fool time brings only age, not wisdom (p. 78).

It was a pity, he reflected, that the men of good will are so poorly armed, for at times it was a handicap not to hate (p. 169).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-10 for some brawling and other non-gory violence, some references to bawdy houses, alcohol consumption by adults, scenes of children in peril, and mild innuendo about men's intentions toward women.  

This is my first book read and reviewed for my fifth Classics Club list!

Did Someone Say "FREE Audiobook"???

I did, it was me.  I said free audiobook, and I meant FREE!!!

ONE Audiobooks, which has produced all of my audiobooks, picks one title from their catalog each month to let people listen to for free.  And, in March, that book is Dancing and Doughnuts, my Twelve Dancing Princesses retelling!

All you have to do is go to the OneAudiobooks website and follow the directions.  Once you save Dancing and Doughnuts to your account, you will have until June 1 to finish listening to it.

It's kind of like borrowing a book from the library, where you have a certain number of weeks to read it, and then you return it.  You don't get to download and keep the book for free, but you get to experience it for free within a certain timeframe.

If you're new to my books, I write cozy Christian westerns.  My Once Upon a Western series retells fairy tales as clean YA historical fiction.  These are non-magical westerns with no cussing or smut, containing sweet PG-level romances and mild violence only (think an old John Wayne movie from the 1950s).  

Dancing and Doughnuts is about a Civil War veteran trying to find work in a small Kansas town.  He takes a job trying to figure out who is spiking the refreshments served at a family-run dance hall.  Twelve sisters, uncountable doughnuts, rowdy cowboys -- nothing can stop our hero from solving this mystery and helping the family resolve some bigger problems in the process.

The audiobook version is read by Steve Corona, whose narration of my book One Bad Apple won a SOVA last year.  Steve has been my ideal narrator for Dancing and Doughnuts since the idea of audiobook editions for my books first entered my head, and he absolutely knocks this narration out of the park. Do yourself a favor and listen to it for free while you can!

"The Greatest Lawyer That Ever Lived: Patrick Henry at the Bar of History" by George Morrow

This is a slim volume containing two essays about Patrick Henry, both by George Morrow.  In both essays, the author contends that Patrick Henry is essentially a mystery to us today for two reasons.  

First, Patrick Henry wasn't obsessed with writing things down OR with keeping records of his writing and speeches for posterity.  He was very gifted as a defense attorney and as a public orator, but his speeches had a strange ability to make people agree with him at the same time as not be able to remember exactly what he said.  So even the speeches we think we know he made, George Morrow says are probably just vague approximations of what he said because Henry didn't keep the speeches he wrote and no one else could remember more than the basic gist of them.  Yes, including the famous "Give me liberty, or give me death speech."

Second, George Morrow makes a convincing case for Thomas Jefferson being virulently envious of Patrick Henry for decades because Henry was a much more accomplished lawyer than Jefferson and a much better public speaker.  Morrow contends that, after Patrick Henry's death, Thomas Jefferson began systematically and effectively erasing Patrick Henry's good qualities from public and private memory alike and replacing them with the idea that Patrick Henry was a mediocre lawyer who got a lucky day in court now and then, was a lazy and cowardly state governor, and so on. 

If nothing else, these two essays have convinced me I need to read more about Patrick Henry and not rely on my memories of what my high school history books said about him thirty years ago.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: G.  Nothing scandalous or untoward here.

This has been my second book read from my #RevolutionaryWarReads list!

"Daniel Boone's Own Story" by Daniel Boone and "The Adventures of Daniel Boone" by Frances Lister Hawkes

How weird that these two short books have never crossed my path before this!  Especially considering what a big fan of Daniel Boone I have been since I was in single digits.  I've read so many junior biographies about him, so many articles... but never his own short account of how he helped open Kentucky for settlement?  Not sure how it escaped me before now.

Well, Daniel Boone's Own Story is the bold adventurer's own recounting of how and when and why he explored Kentucky with his brother and a few friends, how he returned to lead surveyors there, and why he brought his own family with a larger group to settle there.  This all happened before and during the American Revolution, but had little to do with the Revolution except to mention Lord Dunmore a couple of times (he who was Royal Governor of Virginia until the Revolution began) and to talk about refusing to surrender to British authority even as a possible escape from being held captive by a hostile tribe.  

I loved how Daniel Boone expresses himself in this.  He's straight-forward, modest, thoughtful, a little funny here and there, and can turn a pretty phrase.  And he repeatedly credits God with blessing his efforts, helping him and others out of difficulties, and making the beautiful wilderness land that Boone so cherished.

The Adventures of Daniel Boone by Francis Lister Hawks obviously draws on Boone's book, but fleshes the narrative out more.  It talks about Boone's life before and after the opening of Kentucky, which is nice.  I didn't learn much new from it that I hadn't read in other books, but I enjoyed the refresher anyway.  Hawks has a high-flown, old-fashioned writing style that makes Boone seem doubly plainspoken and uncomplicated by comparison.  But I didn't dislike the book just because his prose got a little purple here and there.  

Particularly Good Bits:

So much does friendship triumph over misfortune that sorrows and sufferings vanish at the meeting not only of real friends, but of the most distant acquaintances, and substitute happiness in their room (p. 4, Daniel Boone's Own Story)

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for discussions of torture, some of which would be very disturbing for people with vivid imaginations.

Since these are so short, I am counting them together as my 50th book read for my 4th Classics Club list.  Which means I have finished my list!  Again!  Since January of 2014, I have read and reviewed 200 classic books :-D

(Actually, I've read more classics than that in those ten years, because I only count a book once for the Classics Club, and if I read it again after that, it doesn't count for my lists.)

I'll be making a fifth list soon!  Stay tuned for that...

"Or Give Me Death" by Ann Rinaldi

Whoa.  How is it I've never read an Ann Rinaldi book before?  I guess our small-town library must just not have had any of her books, even though her first book was published the year I was born, because I would have devoured everything of hers I could find.  Historical fiction has been my jam for as long as I can remember, and I read all the historical fiction in the teen section of our library.  Sometimes repeatedly.

Well, you can bet her books are going to show up on this blog after this.

Or Give Me Death is a novelizational look at several very hard years in Patrick Henry's family life, seen through the eyes of two of his daughters.

Did you know Patrick Henry's first wife battled mental illness?  Did you know the family had to eventually lock her up in a suite of rooms they set up in the basement so she couldn't harm the children or herself?

I mean, this sounds like something out of a Charlotte Brontë novel.  Except it's totally true.  While reading Or Give Me Death, I kept looking things up and discovering that, yup, that new-to-me sad or strange fact was true.  Over and over.

The first section of the book is told from the perspective of Patrick Henry's eldest daughter, Patsy.  It begins in 1771, with Patsy gradually realizing her mother is mentally unstable and becoming dangerous.  It shows how much weight descends on Patsy's shoulders as she has to take over mothering her younger siblings and running the household.  She grows up very quickly once they have to confine her mother Sarah, and marries young.  She and her new husband take over running the family estate because Patrick Henry is often away either practicing law or debating revolutionary things with other important leaders.

The second half begins in 1773 and is from the perspective of a younger daughter, Anne.  Anne resents how bossy Patsy has become, resents being told she must grow up and stop living as a carefree child, and resents how many secrets she must keep for the various members of her family.  She has to grow up too quickly and suddenly, but unlike her sister, she has a harder time resigning herself to this.

I felt a lot of sympathy for both sisters, and wished often in the second half of the book that Rinaldi had not made Anne quite so stridently antagonistic toward Patsy.  They are both enduring a really hard reality, as are the rest of the members of the family.  I'm not sure how much of the sibling discord is factual, though I do know that there's a note at the end from Rinaldi saying that Patrick Henry and his family left very little by way of a paper trail, so she had to work mostly from things written about them by their relatives and friends and contemporaries, and extrapolate a lot from what would be common parts of life in Colonial and Revolutionary Virginia.  

While I found the sibling antagonism less than pleasant at times, I still very much enjoyed this book.  And I didn't find that antagonism unrealistic, I just... would have preferred less of it, because then the characters would have been happier, and I generally just want characters to find ways to be happy!  But that's not always realistic or feasible.

Particularly Good Bits:

Dark, unexplainable things happened all the time in the outlands of Virginia (p. 7).

"Ah, we all could do with a little divine vengeance at breakfast," Pa said.  "What better way to start the day?" (p. 51)

When do you keep a secret, and when do you tell?  Do you tell the truth, knowing it will hurt someone?  Or tell a lie to keep from hurting them?  How much does keeping it inside cost?  Eventually it will come out, won't it?  And hurt the person you are trying to protect, anyway (p. 117).

"Our family is broken, Anne.  It happens betimes with families.  So what we must do is know that while other families get to enjoy the whole, we can only enjoy the pieces.  But don't hold them too close.  broken pieces have edges and can hurt.  Look outside the family for your happiness" (p. 164).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for some non-gory violence, scary scenes involving children in peril, descriptions of madness and mad behavior, talk of ghosts and 'second sight,' and a horribly cruel death inflicted on a slave girl (off-page and lightly described, but thoroughly awful).  Definitely a teen read, not for kids.

This has been my first book read from my #RevolutionaryWarReads list!

Top Ten Tuesday: Go Away and Stay Here

This week, our Top Ten Tuesday prompt from That Artsy Reader Girl is "Books for Armchair Travelers."  Here are my ten favorite books with vivid settings that really make you feel like you are visiting their locations!

I'm organizing these alphabetically by title this week because I don't feel like putting them in the order of how much I like them.  I've also included where they take place, and linked the titles to my reviews in case you are curious about them.

1. Big Red by Jim Kjelgaard-- Pennsylvania

2. The Blue Castle by L. M. Montgomery -- Muskoka, Ontario, Canada

3. The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim -- Italy

4. The Hound of the Baskervilles by A. Conan Doyle -- Dartmoor, England

5. Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes -- Boston, Massachusetts

6. Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson -- Scottish Highlands

7. The Lilies of the Field by William E. Barrett -- Rocky Mountains

8. Misty of Chincoteague by Marguerite Henry -- Chincoteague Island, Virginia

9. A Room with a View by E. M. Forster -- Italy

10. Swamp Water by Vareen Bell -- Okeefenokee Swamp, Georgia

What books have you read that have really vivid locations?

"A Heart Adrift" by Laura Frantz

I wouldn't exactly say that A Heart Adrift by Laura Frantz is a retelling of Persuasion by Jane Austen.  But I wouldn't exactly say it's NOT one, either.  Both are second-chance romances involving a capable but rarely understood woman of good family and a sea captain who might make decisions a little too hastily sometimes.  The main characters in both have a best friend who is widowed and runs a business and knows all the local news.  There's only one vain and self-centered sister here, as opposed to two in Persuasion.  And the main character's dad is actually a good and wise father in this.  But there certainly are a lot of similarities.

And, since Persuasion is my favorite Jane Austen novel, I didn't mind that at all!

A Heart Adrift begins in 1755, during what we now call the French and Indian War.  Esmée Shaw spends her days running the chocolaterie her mother founded in York, Virginia, decades earlier.  Her father runs the coffee shop next door.  Both are closer to the waterfront than some snooty genteel folk deem proper, while others are perfectly happy to run the risk of rubbing elbows with seafarers in their quest for famous Shaw chocolates.  

This book made me crave chocolate a lot.  Be warned.

Esmée's sister Eliza is married to a wealthy and influential man with a title and a fine estate and a fancy house in Williamsburg.  She's not pleased at all that her sister is unmarried and runs a shop.  So common!  So quaint!  So much work!  Also, Eliza is pregnant with her first child and convinced that this solidifies her place at the center of the entire world.

Ten years earlier, Esmée turned down a proposal from the man she loved, Captain Henri Lennox.  She still loves him.  He still loves her.  But, at the time, she was absolutely certain that she could never be happy if married to a sea captain who had to leave her all the time.  You see, her father was an admiral and was rarely home when she was growing up, and she saw how hard that was on her mom, and so on.  

Anyway, there's a war on, with the French trying to take over the British colonies in North America, and the Governor of the Virginia Colony wants Captain Lennox to become a privateer and take the fight to the high seas and stop the French from landing so many troops and generally scuttle the French plans.  All Henri Lennox wants to do is build a lighthouse and marry Esmée and be a lighthousekeeper.  But duty calls, etc.

Everything works out very nicely in the end for the main characters, despite the best efforts of the French navy, random scurrilous rogues, a smallpox epidemic, and even (sometimes) Eliza.  

I really loved that this book was set in Williamsburg and York (now Yorktown) because I spend a LOT of time in Colonial Williamsburg, so the characters could be like "I was walking down Duke of Gloucester Street and passed the Raleigh Tavern," and I would be like, "YES!  I have been there!  I know what that looks like!  I know what a spring morning and a fall afternoon and a winter evening feel like there!"

The characters were really well-drawn, and the historical details were almost uniformly delightful.  (Except the use of the term "bluestocking" as slang for "women who think too much," which I don't think was common until about 30 years later.  But that is my only real quibble!!!!!!!)  The love story was paced just perfectly -- we did NOT have to wait nearly 400 pages to get misunderstandings sorted out and come to our senses and so on!  I was a big fan of that.

I am not sure I have ever read adult historical fiction that took place during the French and Indian War before, and that was an absolute treat.  I will definitely be reading more of Laura Frantz's books.

Particularly Good Bits:

The only certainty about life was its uncertainty.  Only God stayed steadfast.  Only the Almighty could walk her through life's many changes.  And when she felt overwhelmed, like now, she simply had to look back to see how faithful God had been, did she not?  The heartaches and closed doors of the past had made the present more beloved (p. 250).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG.  No cussing, no smut, but a little on-page violence and threat of assault against a woman.  Some lightly described kissing, too.

All the Fairy Tale Retellings I Have Reviewed

Not only do I write fairy tale retellings, I love to read them!  And I have reviewed quite a few of them over the years.  So here is a list of all the fairy tale retellings I have reviewed, along with what I rated them and what fairy tale(s) they are retelling.

I've grouped books that belong to a series together, and then have the stand-alones or single titles at the end here.

The Austen Fairy Tales series by Kendra E. Ardnek

Rose Petals and Snowflakes (PG) -- Snow White and Rose Red

Crown and Cinder (PG) -- Cinderella

Emmazel (PG) -- Rapunzel

Snowfield Palace (PG) -- The Snow Queen

Thornrose Estate (PG) -- Beauty and the Beast

A Little Persuaded  (G) -- The Little Mermaid

The Christmas Chronicles (multi-author series)

The Midnight Blizzard by Mary Mecham (PG) -- Cinderella

The Silent Night by Sarah Beran (G) -- Sleeping Beauty

The Evraft series by Jenni Sauer

Wait Until Tomorrow (PG) -- The Steadfast Tin Soldier

Rook di Goo (PG-13) -- Cinderella

Yesterday or Long Ago (PG -- Aladdin

A Little Beside You (PG-13) -- Snow White and Rose Red

Kling Klang Gloria (PG-13) -- Sleeping Beauty + King Thrushbeard

Collections/Anthologies

Blind Beauty and Other Tales of Redemption by Meredith Leigh Burton (PG) -- Beauty and the Beast, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and something else I couldn't identify

Cloaked in Red by Vivian Vande Velde (PG) -- Little Red Riding Hood (multiple short story retellings)

Five Enchanted Roses (anthology) by Kaycee Browning, Savannah Jezowski, Jenelle Schmidt, Dorian Tsukioka, Hayden Wand (PG-13) -- Beauty and the Beast

Five Poisoned Apples (anthology) by Skye Hoffert, Jenelle Hovde, Cortney Manning, Maddie Morrow, Rachael Wallen (PG/PG-13) -- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Once (omnibus) by Elisabeth Grace Foley, Rachel Heffington, J. Grace Pennington, Emily Ann Putzke, Suzannah Rowntree, and Hayden Wand (PG-13) -- Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Rumplestiltskin, The Little Match Girl, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Rapunzel

Stand-alone Novels

Beauty by Robin McKinley (G) -- Beauty and the Beast

Befriending the Beast by Amanda Tero (PG) -- Beauty and the Beast

Corral Nocturne by Elisabeth Grace Foley (G) -- Cinderella

Enchanted by Alethea Kontis (PG-13) -- lots and lots of fairy tales blended together

A Flame Shall Spring from the Embers by Heidi Pekarek (PG) -- Sleeping Beauty

The Goblin and the Dancer by Allison Tebo (PG) -- The Steadfast Tin Soldier

January Snow by Hayden Wand (PG-13) -- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

The Lady and the Lionheart by Joanne Bischof (PG-16) -- Beauty and the Beast

Lost Lake House by Elisabeth Grace Foley (PG) -- Twelve Dancing Princesses

The Merchant's Daughter by Melanie Dickerson (PG-13) -- Beauty and the Beast

The Midnight Show by Sarah Pennington (PG-10) -- Twelve Dancing Princesses

The Reluctant Godfather by Allison Tebo (G) -- Cinderella

Snow White by Matt Phelan (PG) -- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

With Blossoms Gold by Hayden Wand (PG-13) -- Rapunzel

This list is another contribution to my We Love Fairy Tales Week that I am hosting on my other blog, Hamlette's Soliloquy :-)

Top Ten Tuesday: Ever After

This week's Top Ten Tuesday prompt from That Artsy Reader Girl is a Valentine's freebie -- anything about romance, basically.  I'm choosing to share my top ten favorite romantic couples from fairy tale retellings!

I've linked each retelling title to my full review of that book in case you are curious about it, and also provided my movie-style rating and what fairy tale it is retelling.

1. Cori and Bender in A Little Beside You by Jenni Sauer (PG-13) -- Snow White and Rose Red

2. Princess Holly and Dominic Klaus in The Silent Night by Sarah Beran (G) -- Sleeping Beauty

3. Emmazel and Night in Emmazel by Kendra E. Ardnek (PG) -- Rapunzel

4. Snow and Chase in "Falling Snow" by Skye Hoffert (PG-10) -- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

5. Rosanna and Grik in The Goblin and the Dancer by Allison Tebo (PG) -- The Steadfast Tin Soldier

6. Beauty and Beast in Beauty by Robin McKinley (G) -- Beauty and the Beast

7. Rue and Robbie in Wait Until Tomorrow by Jenni Sauer (PG) -- The Steadfast Tin Soldier

8. Ella and Burndee in The Reluctant Godfather by Allison Tebo (G) -- Cinderella

9. Enna and Anthony in A Little Persuaded by Kendra E. Ardnek (G) -- The Little Mermaid

10. Ellie and Cole in Corral Nocturne by Elisabeth Grace Foley (G) -- Cinderella

As well as being my entry for the Top Ten Tuesday linkup this week, this post is also one of my contributions to We Love Fairy Tales Week, a blog party I am hosting on my other blog.  Check out this post for more details, a fun blog tag, and links to all the posts from other participants!  Plus, I'm running a fairy tale-themed giveaway as part of the event, and you are welcome to enter that if you're a fairy tale fan too :-)

"Hours We Regret" by Chelsea Michelle

This was a fun mystery novella :-)  It's kind of a prequel to the Watson Twins mystery series, and I haven't read any other books in this Christian fiction series yet, so I can tell you it works great as an introduction, too.  You don't need to know the characters already.

Twins Chelsea and Michelle Watson live together in a small town.  Michelle is obsessed with trying to find a pattern in a string of recent serial killings not too far from where they live.  Chelsea thinks this is unhealthy.  

When Michelle breaks up with her boyfriend, she takes off into the Appalachians to find some peace and quiet.  When Chelsea can't reach Michelle by phone, she panics.  Has Michelle fallen victim to the serial killer?  Or, has she gone searching for the serial killer?

This is never super-suspenseful, but it does get pretty tense for a few chapters.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for scary situations involving memory loss, disorientation, and possible abduction.  No cuss words, no smut, no gory violence.

"The Murder on the Links" by Agatha Christie

My mom gave me the gorgeous Chiltern Classics edition of The Murder on the Links for Christmas, and I promptly started reading it on Christmas Day.  And finished it a few days after New Year's.  And took almost a month to get around to reviewing it.

I swear this isn't because I didn't enjoy this mystery!  I definitely did -- it had some lovely twists I didn't see coming, plus a couple that I thought I saw coming but was not quite correct about.  Hanging out with Poirot and Hastings was delightful.  Watching Hastings fall in love without noticing was adorable.  

I don't have anything particularly long-winded to say about this book.  That's partly because it simply is a good mystery, and I have no bones to pick with it.  And it's partly because I did read this almost a month ago and then fell prey to the busyness of January and failed to review it until now.

I would like to mention that I do rather like Hastings, and I know a lot of Poirot fans don't.  My affection for him stems pretty much entirely from his portrayal by Jonathan Cecil in several of the 1980s Hercule Poirot films starring Peter Ustinov.  Cecil plays Hastings as so sweet and likeable, albeit definitely not bright, and I shall probably always be fond of him as a result.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for murder, insinuations about people having extramarital affairs, and a sprinkling of old-fashioned cuss words.

This is my 49th book read and reviewed for my fourth Classics Club list!  One more to go, and I'll have read and reviewed 200 classics since 2014!

Top Ten Tuesday: Look What I Found!

This week's Top Ten Tuesday prompt from That Artsy Reader Girl is "Bookish Discoveries I made in 2025."

Here are ten authors I read for the first time in 2025!  I've put them in alphabetical order by last name because I don't have the emotional energy today to rank them by favorites.  After each name is the title of the first book I read by them, and that title links to my review.  I've also included what I rated those particular books, and a little something about them.

Sarah Beran -- The Silent Night (G), a fantasy Christmas fairy tale retelling

Elisabeth Aimee Brown -- What Comes of Attending the Commoners Ball (PG-13), a humorous fantasy fairy tale retelling

Carrie Brownell -- The Golden Hour (G), a Christmas fable picture book

Erle Stanley Gardner -- The Case of the Glamorous Ghost (PG-13), a mystery plus courtroom drama starring Perry Mason

Emily Golus -- Crack the Stone (PG-13), a fantasy retelling of Les Miserables

B. R. Goodwin -- Forget Me Knot (PG-16), a clean Christian romcom involving a bakery

Amber Lambda -- Comets Fade with Summer (PG-13), a clean Christian YA magical-realism teen romance

Catherine Louisa Pirkis -- The Experiences of Loveday Brooke, Lady Detective (PG), a collection of classic Victorian detective stories

Toni Shiloh -- A Run at Love (PG), a clean Christian romcom involving horse racing

Jaime Jo Wright -- The Souls of Lost Lake (PG-16), a dark Christian suspense mystery with a dual timeline

Have you read any books by these authors?  Did you share a Top Ten Tuesday post this week?  Please share!

#RevolutionaryWarReads in 2026

I mentioned earlier this month that I am planning to read at least thirteen books about or set during the American Revolution this year, one for each of the original thirteen colonies.  That feels like a really fun way to celebrate our nation's 250th birthday all year long!

Several people have asked if I would share my list of books I plan to read, and so I am doing exactly that in this post.  I will also be posting about this from time to time on my Instagram account and using the hashtag #RevolutionaryWarReads when I do.

I made one change from the plans I originally set forth in graphic you see above because I discovered that one of the books I planned to read (A Heart Adrift by Laura Frantz) actually takes place in the 1750s, not the 1770s.  I'm reading that right now anyway, and really enjoying it!  But it won't count toward my challenge.

Here are the books I currently plan to read:

Fiction

1. The Lady and the Loyalist by Stephanie McRae (Heart of the Revolution, book 1)

2. The Hero and the Patriot by Stephanie McRae (Heart of the Revolution, book 2)

3. Heart of the Revolution book 3 by Stephanie McRae (releases later this year)

4. Or Give Me Death by Ann Rinaldi

5. Spark of the Revolution by Megan Soja (Harbor of Spies, book 1)

6. Secrets of the Revolution by Megan Soja (Harbor of Spies, book 2)

7. Scars of the Revolution by Megan Soja (Harbor of Spies, book 3)

8. Harbor of Spies book 4 by Megan Soja (releases later this year)

Non-Fiction

9. The Greatest Lawyer That Ever Lived: Patrick Henry at the Bar of History by George Morrow

10. Rebels at Sea: Privateering in the American Revolution by Eric Jay Dolin

11. Strange and Obscure Stories of the Revolutionary War by Tim Rowland

12. The Swamp Fox, Francis Marion by Noel Gerson

13. Washington's Spies by Alexander Rose

I already own copies of all of these, except for those two unreleased books, so this will also be a good exercise in reading things off my TBR shelves!

Are you planning to read some books about the American Revolution in 2026?  Have you read any of these?  Let me know!

"Winter Fire: Christmas with G. K. Chesterton" by Ryan Whitaker Smith

What an intriguing concept for a devotion book!

Ryan Whitaker Smith chose thirty passages from G. K. Chesterton's writings that deal with Christmas, then paired them with Scripture verses and wrote a daily devotion around each pairing.  I had a great time reading one each morning in December, and then I spent the next week or so reading through the poems, essays, and a couple of short stories by Chesterton that fill out the second half of the book.  

And there are even some fun traditional British Christmas recipes!  They're things that got mentioned elsewhere in the book, and I just might have to try my hand at a couple of them.  And the book ends with explanations of some fun old-fashioned games to play with friends and family.  

All in all, this book is a little treasure trove, and I'm glad I have added it to my library :-)

Particularly Good Bits:

Our natural disposition is rarely the personification of cheerfulness. On this point it is crucial to remember that habits only become habits through repetition. The more we practice joy, the more effortlessly it will come to us. The more we revel, the more we will become revelers. The more we embody cheerfulness, the more naturally we will be of good cheer. Thank God that Christmas descends so inconsiderately upon us, giving a "last push" to those "afraid to be festive" -- for often we are numbered among them (p. 68).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  G.  Nothing here you couldn't read aloud as a family.

A Party "Up Back" -- Inklings in January, 2026

It's been a long, long time since I participated in one of Heidi's Inklings link-ups on her blog Along the Brandywine, but I'm hoping to be part of the fun again.

This month, Heidi invites us to share a party scene from a book or movie.  I'm choosing to share a bit from a memorable party scene in The Blue Castle by L. M. Montgomery.  

(From my Bookstagram account)

As a bit of context, this party takes place in remote, rural Canada in the 1920s.  Valancy Stirling grew up in a repressive, snobby family in a small town and has only heard vague rumors about the dances "up back" in the wild regions far from town.  But her employer has been hired to play his fiddle for the dance and invites her to attend, and she decides it's time to attend a party again after years of being convinced she's too much of an old maid.  So, off she goes, and here's what happens (but shortened a bit here and there because it's kind of a long passage):

At first, the dance was quiet enough, and Valancy was amused and entertained.  She even danced twice herself, with a couple of nice 'up back' boys who danced beautifully and told her she did, too...

The big room was decorated with pine and fir boughs, and lighted by Chinese lanterns.  The floor was waxed, and Roaring Abel's fiddle, purring under his skilled touch, worked magic.  The 'up back' girls were pretty and prettily dressed.  Valancy thought it the nicest party she had ever attended.

By eleven o'clock she had changed her mind.  A new crowd had arrived -- a crowd unmistakably drunk.  Whiskey began to circulate freely.  Very soon almost all the men were partly drunk... The room grew noisy and reeking.  Quarrels started up here and there... The girls, swung rudely in the dances, became dishevelled and tawdry.  Valancy, alone in her corner, was feeling disgusted and repentant.  Why had she ever come to such a place?  Freedom and independence were all very well, but one should not be a little fool... Her head was aching -- she was sick of the whole thing.  But what could she do?  She must stay to the end.  Abel could not leave till then.  And that would probably be not till three or four in the morning.

The new influx of boys had left the girls far in the minority and partners were scarce.  Valancy was pestered with invitations to dance.  She refused them all shortly, and some of her refusals were not well taken.  There were muttered oaths and sullen looks.  Across the room she saw a group of the strangers talking together and glancing meaningly at her.  What were they plotting?

It was at this moment that she saw Barney Snaith looking in over the heads of the crowds at the doorway.  Valancy had two distinct convictions -- one was that she was quite safe no; the other was that this was why she had wanted to come to the dance.  It had been such an absurd hope that she had not recognised it before, but now she knew she had come because of the possibility that Barney might be there, too.  She thought that perhaps she ought to be ashamed for this, but she wasn't.  After her feeling of relief her next feeling was one of annoyance with Barney for coming there unshaved.  Surely he might have enough self-respect to groom himself up decently when he went to a party.  There he was, bareheaded, bristly-chinned, in his old trousers and his blue homespun shirt.  Not even a coat.  Valancy could have shaken him in her anger.  No wonder people believed everything bad of him.

It's a pretty big turning point in a book filled with turning points -- Valancy realizing she wanted to go to a party only because she might see Barney Snaith, the local "bad boy" that no one "decent" associates with because a) he drives a constantly-breaking-down car, b) he goes for drives in said car with no hat on, and c) no one knows where or how he gets enough money to live on.  Absolute scoundrel, obviously.  But very kind to people who don't stick their noses up at him, as Valancy has recently learned.  

(Also from my Bookstagram account)

I think the most telling thing, though Valancy doesn't recognize it at the time, is that she feels angry that Barney seems to have no self-respect.  It's almost like she feels the need to protect him from the spiteful thoughts of others, and she's upset because he's just giving them more reasons to judge him unfairly.  It's a first step toward Valancy understanding her own heart, even if she doesn't realize it quite yet.

There's a bit more to the party scene, but I won't share it here so that anyone who hasn't read The Blue Castle yet will have some fun surprises in this chapter yet :-)

(One more from my Bookstagram account)

Heidi is actually the person who convinced me to read The Blue Castle in the first place.  Friends kept talking about it, and she is the one who finally convinced me to check it out from the library.  And now it's one of my top favorite books of all time!

Have you read The Blue Castle?  If so, do you remember this scene?  If not, what are you waiting for?

Reading Goals Behind and Ahead

I like goals.  Even when I don't reach them.  Last January, I set a few reading goals for the year, and I finally have a few minutes to look over how that all worked out.

I wanted to read 55 books.  I read 68!  Huzzah!

I wanted to read at least 12 classics for my fourth Classics Club list.  I read 15!  Sweet!

I also wanted to read at least 12 books about people who are substantially different from myself.  And I read 16!  Yay!

I also chose 25 books I wanted to read in 2025, some of them rereads and some new reads.  I read 7 of them.  Epic fail.  Didn't even read 1/3 of them.  Sigh.  Oh well.

Now, time for my 2026 reading goals!

I want to read 13 books about or set during the American Revolution in 2026 to mark our nation's 250th birthday.  I'm listing them under #RevolutionaryWarReads on Instagram, if you are curious.  I hope to do a post just about that pretty soon.

Once again, I aim to read at least 12 classics and 12 diverse books.

And I'm setting my overall goal at 55 again because I know that will keep me reading but not daunt me.

Have you shared any reading plans or goals for 2026?  If so, drop me a link in the comments so I can see what you're planning!