Top Ten Tuesday: Autumn Serenade

Today's Top Ten Tuesday prompt is "Book Covers Featuring Autumnal Colors."  I think that red, orange, yellow, and brown are the most autumnal colors, so today, I'm sharing my ten favorite books that have covers featuring those colors!

But first, here's the song I referenced in my post title, in case you want to listen to it:

All titles are linked to my full reviews, but I've provided a thought or two about each book here too.

1. The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle -- the ultimate October read!  A classic Sherlock Holmes mystery with an eerie setting, a spectral opponent, and a thrilling mystery to solve.

2. Shane by Jack Schaefer -- a deceptively quiet and simple western with deep and rich emotions under the surface.

3. The Black Stallion by Walter Farley -- a teen boy forges a friendship with a wild horse thanks to both surviving a shipwreck and life on a deserted island by working together.  The first half of the book is my favorite, but the later horse racing stuff is pretty cool too, if somehow less believable. 

4. The Beekeeper's Apprentice by Laure R. King -- Sherlock Holmes takes a teen girl under his wing during WWI, and they discover an unlikely and marvelous kinship.  I'm reading this aloud to my daughters right now.

5. The Indian in the Cupboard by Lynne Reid Banks -- a magical cupboard makes toys come to life, which ends up teaching a boy a lot about responsibility.

6. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury -- burning books is bad; this book is good; every time I read it, it gets more eerily prescient of modern life.

7. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J. K. Rowling -- my favorite Harry Potter book, largely because it revolves around my favorite character.

8. Up from Dust by Heather Kaufman -- Biblical fiction about Martha from Bethany.

9. A Flame in the Dark by Sarah Baughman -- historical fiction about a German man living during the Protestant Reformation, occasionally interacting with Martin Luther.

10. The Man in the Box by Marylois Dunn -- a Vietnamese boy and an American soldier forge a friendship despite the Vietnam War raging around them.

That's all for me this week!  Do you agree that the colors of these covers look autumnal?  Did you do a Top Ten Tuesday list this week too?  Let's chat in the comments!

"Liberty's Children: Stories of Eleven Revolutionary War Children" by Scotti Cohn

I picked up this book while in Colonial Williamsburg over the Fourth of July weekend this summer.  It looked like it might provide some different perspectives on the American Revolution than the other books I'd been reading, most of which focus on adults or fictional children.  And that's exactly what it did.

The wartime experiences of eleven different children are told in this book.  They come from a pretty wide cross-section of the country -- there are city kids and country kids, free white kids and enslaved black kids, teenagers and kids in the single digits, boys and girls.  And all of them were new to me -- although I had read about many of the broader events they were involved in, none of these specific historical figures were people I'd read about before.

All of that combined to make this slim volume -- a little over 120 pages, not including the endnotes -- a fascinating addition to my quest to read at least thirteen books set during the American Revolution in this, our nation's 250th year.  

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG for descriptions of wartime violence and danger.

This is book 10 of my #RevolutionaryWarReads quest!

"Murder at Somerset House" by Andrea Penrose

The Wrexford and Sloane Historical Mystery series still has not disappointed me once.  These books are a continual delight, and I am collecting them up now so that I can reread them in the future because I know I will want to.

Murder at Somerset House is no exception.  To the quirky, blended family that Wrex and Charlotte have formed, we get a new addition: a preteen girl with a passion for raising and training carrier pigeons.  It may take her a while to grow accustomed to a family that includes a notoriously volatile Earl who dabbles in chemistry, an unconventional artist skilled at both the art of satire and the art of disguise, two former street urchins who love mathematics and art and mischief, and a biracial scientific prodigy... and all of whom have a penchant for pursuing truth and justice by solving crimes together.  Who wouldn't be daunted?  And who wouldn't love them?

As usual, the plot revolves around the cutting-edge science and technology of Regency England, this time with a healthy dose of Napoleonic danger added to the intrigue.  Spying, secrecy, and science make for a combustible combination, and no mistake.  Also, this may sound really weird, but the stock exchange played a vital role in this book, and I now actually kind of understand how trading stocks and bonds and such works, for the first time in my life.  That's pretty nifty.

Particularly Good Bits:

"Self-reliance -- the art of knowing how to think through problems and solve them -- is a fundamentally important skill to have in life" (p. 167).

"Taking joy in each other's passions is part of the bonds that tie a family together" (p. 250).

Henning let out a rusty laugh.  "Is there anyone normal in this family?"

"Heaven forfend," drawled the earl.  "They wouldn't last long" (p. 286).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for murder, violence, and some era-appropriate cussing.

"The Secret Adversary" by Agatha Christie

I'm a Tommy and Tuppence fan now.

I'd read a few short stories about them previously, but this is the first of their books I've read.  And it's the first book Agatha Christie wrote about them, so I guess it was a good place to start.  I am now on the hunt for the rest of the series.  Can't decide if I want to track them down one by one or just buy a boxed set.

Anyway!  The Secret Adversary is actually almost more a spy novel than a mystery.  It's all about trying to find a female passenger of the Lusitania who disappeared while carrying very important diplomatic papers.  Those papers are still vitally important even though the war was over, as Soviet Communists are trying to find and use them to take down the British government.

Tommy Beresford and Prudence "Tuppence" Cowley are two young adults who are kind of at loose ends now that the Great War has ended.  They decide to become Adventurers, and end up trying to find this missing woman, rescue each other from various predicaments, and save Great Britain.  And gradually realize they may have a future together as more than good friends, too.  Honestly, the understated but realistic unfolding of their romance was one of my favorite things about the whole book.  We readers could see they loved each other, but it took them until nearly the end of the book to each independently realize they loved the other person, and make their feelings plain.  Really good stuff.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for threats of torture, some violence, and lots of perilous situations.  I think there were also a few mild cuss words.

This is my 9th book read and reviewed for my fifth Classics Club list.

"Scars of the Revolution" by Megan Soja

This third book in the Harbor of Spies series was the most tense yet. Also, it might have my favorite romance so far.  I definitely liked its romantic interest, the honorable and stalwart Isaac Harrison, best of all the series's menfolks so far.  

Libby had a girlish crush on Isaac when he was friends with her father years ago.  That crush has deepened into adult attraction, but she is uncertain if he sees her as a woman now, or still thinks of her as his friend's young daughter.  As for Isaac, he's a British officer in a highly respected military unit who finds himself uncertain if he is on the right side of the emerging conflict between Britain and America.

Spying happens, obviously.  Familiar characters from the previous books weave in and out.  And a plot that could have hinged on miscommunication instead hinges on honest communication combined with confusion over one's own duties rather than over someone else's intentions -- and I appreciated that A Lot.

Particularly Good Bits:

"I need busy hands, else my mind becomes occupied with worries better left to the Lord" (p. 62).

"It is not weak or insignificant to live a simple life, marked by everyday tasks that often go unnoticed, yet would be sorely missed should they cease to be done" (p. 252).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for wartime violence, descriptions of wounds and illness, sweet romance including lightly described kisses, a lot of yearning, and a scene in which a man appears about ready to assault a woman.  No cussing or smut.

This has been my ninth book read for my personal #RevolutionaryWarReads challenge.

"The Casebook of Sidney Zoom" by Erle Stanley Gardner, edited by Bill Pronzini

This is a collection of short stories and novellas that Erle Stanley Gardner wrote for the pulp magazines back in the 1930s.  They are fast-paced and far-fetched and absolutely delightful.  I lingered my way through the last few because I didn't want to be finished with the book.  Happily, there are a couple more stories about Sidney Zoom that weren't included here, so I have those to look forward to.

Sidney Zoom is an independently wealthy man (somewhat like The Shadow, who also was a big pulp fiction hero) who uses unorthodox means (again, like The Shadow) to rescue people in despair and right wrongs that have been committed against them.  He lives on a yacht with his retired police dog, Rip, and employs a sympathetic secretary to help carry out his habit of dispensing justice and hope.  He loves to wander the city streets at night in search of a lost person on the verge of suicide or some other desperate act, so he can swoop in, learn about their problems, and solve things for them.  Usually, this involves him concocting some barely legal scam.  Often, it involves Zoom donning an elaborate disguise.

Even though the bounds of my credulity got stretched again and again, these stories were such enjoyable romps that I didn't really care if they were plausible or not.  Sidney Zoom himself is a delightful enigma, and his dog is a perfect sidekick for the era.  Think Rin-Tin-Tin, Lassie, and Bullet all rolled up in one.  I can't quite put my finger on why I loved them so much -- maybe because they demanded only that I hang on for the wild ride in every story, not that I believe they could exist.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for a lot of violence and crime, and occasional mild cussing.  No actual gore, and no smut.

The Reader Problems Tag

The Hopeful Pen tagged me with this on her blog, With Joy for the Work.  Months ago.  Oops!  Well, I have had fun filling it out, and that's the main thing, right?

You have 20,000 books on your TBR. How in the world do you decide what to read next? 

I either pick what I'm in the mood for, or I have to read a book for one of the two book clubs I'm in.  I'm definitely a mood reader, so there's really never any good way to predict what I'll read next.

You’re halfway through a book and you’re just not loving it. Do you quit or are you committed? 

I give most books 50 pages or 5 chapters to click for me, whichever takes longer.  If it's not working for me by that point, I feel free to give up.  So if I get halfway through a book and don't love it, I definitely wouldn't feel bad about DNFing it.

The end of the year is coming and you’re so close, but so far away on your Goodreads reading challenge. Do you try to catch up and how? 

I don't really care much about my Goodreads challenge numbers.  I set it for 55 books every year, which is a little more than one book a week.  I generally don't have a problem hitting that.  Sometimes I far surpass it.  Sometimes I don't.

(My 2026 reading so far.  All photos in this post are from my Instagram.)

The covers of a series you love do. not. match. How do you cope? 

I frown, growl, complain loudly, and roll my eyes at the publishers.  Why do they do this to us???

Every one and their mother loves a book you really don’t like. Who do you bond with over shared feelings? 

My best friend, probably.  She and I both rarely read super popular books because we both rarely enjoy them.

You’re reading a book and you are about to start crying in public. How do you deal? 

It happens.  I cried in the break room at work over Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.  Work friends were kind about it -- I think someone even brought the box of tissues over for me.  If strangers see me crying over a book and find it weird, who cares?

A sequel of a book you loved just came out, but you’ve forgotten a lot from the prior novel. Will you re-read the book? Skip the sequel? Try to find a synopsis on Goodreads? Cry in frustration?! 

I quite often will just re-read the book.  If I loved it, that means I want to re-read it at some point anyway, so why not right then?

You do not want anyone. ANYONE. borrowing your books. How do you politely tell people nope when they ask? 

I'm not super possessive about most of my books, but I do expect loans to come back to me in the same basic condition I loaned them out in.  And it would be nice to get them back within 3 or 4 months.  I've been known to buy a new copy to loan a friend if I know they either take a year to return books OR have a bad habit of destroying books by cracking their spines until the titles are unreadable and the books won't close properly ever again.  But I have also been known to use loaning a book to a friend like that as a reason to buy a prettier or cooler edition for myself, too ;-)

(My Blue Castle collection, so I can loan some and keep some.)

You’ve picked up and put down 5 books in the last month. How do you get over your reading slump? 

Well, I often have three to five books going at an time, so that wouldn't be super weird.  But when I am in a reading slump, I usually read a Nero Wolfe mystery by Rex Stout, and then I'm all good again.

There are so many new books coming out that you’re dying to read! How many do you actually buy? 

Only the ones I'm pretty sure I won't be able to get from the library (indie books, mainly) OR that are from my two or three auto-buy authors.  I don't have the budget or the space to buy every book I want to read.  (When my husband reads this, he may be shocked by this answer...)

After you’ve bought the new books you can’t wait to get to, how long do they sit on your shelf before you get to them?

A day?  A year?  A decade?  I'm a mood reader, so there's no way of knowing, really.  I have a couple books on my shelves that were given to me before my son was born.  He just started college.  

(For instance, I have read 1 of these 5 books that I bought last summer.)

I am not tagging anyone with this because I'm tired today, but if you would like to fill this tag out, here is a fresh list of the questions:

You have 20,000 books on your TBR. How in the world do you decide what to read next? 

You’re halfway through a book and you’re just not loving it. Do you quit or are you committed? 

The end of the year is coming and you’re so close, but so far away on your Goodreads reading challenge. Do you try to catch up and how? 

The covers of a series you love do. not. match. How do you cope? 

Every one and their mother loves a book you really don’t like. Who do you bond with over shared feelings? 

You’re reading a book and you are about to start crying in public. How do you deal? 

A sequel of a book you loved just came out, but you’ve forgotten a lot from the prior novel. Will you re-read the book? Skip the sequel? Try to find a synopsis on Goodreads? Cry in frustration?! 

You do not want anyone. ANYONE. borrowing your books. How do you politely tell people nope when they ask? 

You’ve picked up and put down 5 books in the last month. How do you get over your reading slump? 

There are so many new books coming out that you’re dying to read! How many do you actually buy? 

After you’ve bought the new books you can’t wait to get to, how long do they sit on your shelf before you get to them?

"Major Fireworks" by B. R. Goodwin

This third Sugartree book may be my favorite one yet.  I enjoyed it a lot more than Honeysuckle Breeze, and a bit more than Southern Snow, too.  I really, genuinely liked both main characters, and I enjoyed spending time with both of them, not just one or the other.  Makes a huge difference.

Dakota Remillard is trying to figure out how to make a difference in the world, after spending the first few years of his adult life treading water, metaphorically.  He's also trying to figure out why he can't seem to get himself to quit being interested in Sadie, the manager of his family's small-town coffee shop.  She's made it clear she doesn't want to date him, but he can't stop hoping she'll magically change her mind.

Sadie wishes Dakota would just go away and quit being so interesting and kind and hopeful, because then she could stop feeling bad for disappointing him repeatedly.  She's got too much baggage from her past to consider trying to share a life with anyone.  Her parents are in the middle of a huge life change, so her whole world is in flux, and she just wants everything to calm down.

And so, of course, Dakota and Sadie set out on an epic road trip to pick up coffee beans for the shop, and everything goes kaplooey, until it doesn't.  As one expects.

B. R. Goodwin consistently makes me chuckle aloud with her books, and this one is no exception.  She's also aces at writing relatable Christian human beings. 

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-16 for some innuendo about a married couple's plans for the evening, lots of attraction between a man and a woman, many instances of dialog between friends being pretty open about their attraction to other people, and a discussion involving French kissing.  No smut, but more smoochy content than I would hand to a young teen.  No cussing or violence.

"The Mysterious Mr. Quin" by Agatha Christie

I really like the Mr. Quin mysteries.  Really, REALLY like them.  I read a few of them previously, in those seasonal Agatha Christie collections, and I liked them so much that I picked up this anthology that has nearly all of the Mr. Quin stories in it.  (WHY did they decide to leave a couple out?  So annoying.  Now I have to track those down.)

The Mr. Quin stories all revolve an aging gentleman named Mr. Satterthwaite who has spent his life cultivating a peerless taste in art of every kind.  He knows many, many people, and often happens to be at someone's estate when someone is in dire straits, or encounters desperate people while on holiday, and so on.  Then the mysterious Mr. Harley Quin will show up and give Mr. Satterthwaite a helpful hint or a nudge of some kind, and events will take a sudden turn, usually for the better.  Several suicides and murders are avoided, some grave disappointments are averted, and some crimes are solved over the course of the book.  And many of the stories have just a touch of eeriness, but no actual creepiness.  

This would have been a great collection to read in October around Halloween, and I'll probably reread it in the autumn in a couple of years, once I have forgotten how most of the mysteries turn out.  That way, they will be fresh and delightful again.  Happily, I only remembered the solution to one of the stories I had previously read, and I only remembered it about a page before we got to the reveal.  Quite delightful.

My favorite stories in the collection were "The Face of Helen," "The Dead Harlequin," and "The World's End."

Particularly Good Bits:

Mr. Satterthwaite put away the little set speech he had prepared, and hastily rummaged for sympathy and friendship in the bottom drawer of his mind (p. 183, from "The Face of Helen).

He was a sensible young man, and, as such, uninteresting to Mr. Satterthwaite, who was an artist and a connoisseur in life (p. 249, from "The Bird with the Broken Wing").

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  PG-13 for several murders, discussions of and depictions of suicide, and other crimes.

This is my 8th book read and reviewed for my fifth Classics Club list.

"The Sweet Life" by Suzanne Woods Fisher

If you love ice cream, you will probably enjoy this book, because a LOT of it revolves around making and consuming ice cream.  I read the whole book in one day while on a road trip and insisted we stop somewhere with ice cream for supper because I neeeeeded some.

When Dawn Dixon's fiancé calls off their wedding and, that same day, she learns her widowed mom has secretly been battling cancer, Dawn goes into an emotional tailspin.  Her fiancé insists she go on their already-paid-for-and-non-refundable honeymoon trip to Cape Cod, and take whomever along she wants.  Dawn picks her mom, Marnie.  Marnie is unpredictable, freewheeling, and secretive.  Dawn is secretive too, but prefers that her life be predictable and regimented, so she and her mom clash a lot, especially when Marnie decides to buy a dilapidated historic building and turn it into a quaint ice cream shop.   With Dawn's help, because Dawn loves to make ice cream.

This is the first book of a series, so not everything gets figured out and resolved by the end, but the ice cream shop does open, and the two main characters do come to understand each other much better.

I really liked that this book revolved around the relationship between a mother and daughter, rather than around a romantic relationship, though those existed on the fringes of the story.  And I loved all the ice cream making :-)  And I liked that Marnie had solid faith in God and was a regular churchgoer, but Dawn didn't and wasn't, so we got to see a mother helping her daughter grow and mature in her faith.  That was cool.  

However, the writing was very simplistic most of the time, almost to the point of being clunky.  There was also an awful lot of telling us how a person felt or what kind of person they were, rather than showing us those things.

Particularly Good Bits:

She was a big believer in miracles.  Big ones, small ones, everyday ones.  You just had to keep your eyes on the lookout for them (p. 29).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG.  You have some romantic sparkage here and there, but it's not exactly a "kissing book."

"The First Fast Draw" by Louis L'Amour

Well, this was not a new favorite L'Amour book, but it was still fun.  And I read it in like three days, so you know the pacing was excellent.  Kept me turning those pages like crazy!

Cullen Baker returns home to Texas after the Civil War ended.  He didn't really participate in the war, but everyone assumes he did.  The people who hated him when he was a kid living there still hate him.  Seems like the only people who don't want to punch or shoot him are outlaws... and Katy Thorne.  Katy is from one of the best families in the area, but even her friendship can't save him from greedy carpetbaggers and a variety of other creeps.  Cullen just wants to farm the land he already owns, but everyone keeps blaming him for all sorts of crimes he didn't commit, just because he makes a handy scapegoat.  Eventually, Cullen takes after the people who hate him, and the sparks fly fast and furious.

I know this is an earlier L'Amour book, so I'll cut the too-fast ending some slack.  It's a fun read, and I liked Cullen and Katy a lot.

Particularly Good Bits:

A really rough man never has to prove anything to anybody, he knows what he can do and he doesn't care even a mite whether anybody else knows it or not.  With a youngster it's otherwise.  He figures he's got to show everybody how tough he is or nobody will believe it, so he winds up in plenty of grief (p. 9).

One thing I'd learned was it mattered mighty little how much money a man had as long as he was contented (p. 13).

For a man to be a peace with himself was important, Will said, not what people say.  People are often wrong, and public opinion can change, and the hatreds of people are rarely reasonable things.  I can hear him yet.  He used to say there was no use a man wearing himself out with hatred an dill-feeling, and time proved it out (p. 13).

A few men riding into the street meant nothing to anybody, not those days.  There were loose men from everywhere, just drifting, hunting they knew not what, men who had lost what they had i the war and were hoping, away back inside their skulls, to find it somewhere else (p 53).

To have friends a man has to be friendly, and to get others to think of you, you have to think of others (p. 145).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for violence and threats made to a woman.  Some cussing, obviously a good bit of western violence, but no smut.

"Williamsburg at War: Virginia's Colonial Capital in the Revolutionary War" by Michael Cecere

I picked this book up while at Colonial Williamsburg last month to celebrate July 4th.  And started to read it while staying in a house that was build in the 1750s on the other side of the James River from Williamsburg.  And then it took me more than a month to finish it, but it still seemed like the perfect time and place to start reading.

Williamsburg at War was particularly interesting to me once we got past the lead-up-to-the-war part.  Having been to Colonial Williamsburg dozens of times, I know a good bit about the Powder Magazine Incident and Lord Dunmore (who the colonists all wished had done less) fleeing Virginia and so on.  But everything past that point was pretty new to me, and I liked getting to learn new and interesting things about a place that is dear to my heart.

I particularly liked the author's point at the very end of the book, that the fact that the capitol of Virginia was moved to Richmond during the war meant that Williamsburg sank into relative obscurity... which made many parts of it remain fairly unchanged over the next hundred and fifty years, allowing for the Rockefellers and the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation to create the most amazing living history experience right where history happened, without having to tear down a lot of skyscrapers or something.  I had always felt kind of sad for Williamsburg, getting left in the dust back then, but now I see that it was actually a blessing for us today.

Also, I was greatly amused by this one bit of complaining from a European officer, Captain Ewald, about the misery of summer in Virginia:

"For six weeks the heat has been so unbearable that many men have been lost to sunstroke or their reason has been impaired.  Everything that one has on his body is soaked as with water from the constant perspiration." (p. 187).

I regret to say Virginia summers have not changed.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG for discussions of warfare, including things written about war and death by people who experienced it.

This has been my 8th book read and reviewed for my #RevolutionaryWarReads challenge.  I've bought a lot of new books about the Revolution this year, because of it being American's 250th birthday, so I've made an entirely new graphic to display just the books I have read for this challenge, not the ones I might read.  I'm still aiming for thirteen by the end of the year, one for each of the original colonies.

"The Leavenworth Case" by Anna Katherine Green

I probably never would have read this if it hadn't been for Patricia Meredith's book A Deed of Dreadful Note.  That book is a fictional imagining of how Green could have gotten the ideas she needed to write The Leavenworth Case.  It took me a few years to get around to reading the original, but I'm very happy I kept it on my TBR and finally made time to read it, because I very much enjoyed it.

A wealthy merchant is murdered.  His two nieces, whom he has raised, are the prime suspects.  Particularly since one of them has become an heiress thanks to this murder.  We get two detectives in this book, one professional and one amateur.  The professional is a New York police investigator named Ebenezer Gryce, while the amateur is a young lawyer named Everett Raymond, who also narrates the book.  Gryce has the wisdom and experience needed, but Raymond has a personal stake in things that aids his natural cleverness.  He falls in love with one of the dead man's nieces over the course of the book.

From what I have read, The Leavenworth Case was a really popular book when it was released in 1878.  Green has been called the Mother of Detective Fiction because her Detective Gryce books (she wrote quite a few more) made the genre popular almost a decade before the first Sherlock Holmes stories appeared.  She made the detective series popular in particular, and also is credited with inventing the "girl detective" type in a later book.

For me, The Leavenworth Case was remarkable not just for being so seminal to my favorite genre, but also for being a really satisfying mystery.  A lot of very early detective fiction can feel simplistic or even a bit twee, but this book kept me guessing until the big reveal.  I will say it's got a slow and contemplative pacing that some modern readers might not appreciate, and there was also a long letter of confession from the murderer at the end that felt unnecessary, but those weren't big enough detractions to make me dislike the book as a whole.  I hope to find more of the Detective Gryce books to read in the future.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG for murder and related subject matter.  No cussing, gory violence (though blood spatter and brains are briefly mentioned) or smut.

This has been my 7th book read for my 5th Classics Club list.

Top Ten Tuesday: Bygone August Books

This month's Top Ten Tuesday prompt from That Artsy Reader Girl is "Books I was reading on this day mid-August over the past ten years."  I keep a monthly record of what books I read and what movies I watched, and it's really fun to go looking back through that for things like this!  But it does mean I don't necessarily know what I was reading on a specific day, so I just aimed for things toward the middle of my list for each August.

I've linked the titles to my own reviews, in case you want to know more about any particular book.

2016 -- Rainbow Valley by L. M. Montgomery (classic, coming-of-age, World War One, Canada)

2017 -- Rules of Murder by Julianna Deering (Christian, mystery, historical fiction, 1930s Britain)

2018 -- Famous Gunfighters of the Western Frontier by W. B. "Bat" Masterson (non-fiction, Old West history, essays)

2019 -- War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (classic, Russian, Napoleonic Wars)

2020 -- Rook di Goo by Jenni Sauer (fairy tale retelling, sci-fi + fantasy, strong heroine, found family)

2021 -- The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (classic, swashbuckler)

2022 -- Rose Petals and Snowflakes by Kendra E. Ardnek (fairy tale retelling, fantasy, Jane Austen retelling, sisterhood)

2023 -- The Last Atlantean  by Emily Hayse (Christian, historicalesque fantasy)

2024 -- The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle (classic, fantasy)

2025 -- The Case of the Footloose Doll by Erle Stanley Gardner (Perry Mason, mystery, courtroom drama)

Do you keep track of what you read?  If so, how?

"Grits and Glamor" by B. R. Goodwin

Because I enjoy cooking and love to bake, I always like reading books where the main character's job involves the kitchen.  B. R. Goodwin writes quite a few characters who have mad culinary skillz, and Grits and Glamor fully lives up to my expectations in this department.

Chloe Garland is a professional private chef.  As in, went to fancy cooking schools and everything.  She's also awkward, funny, kind, helpful, and a strong Christian woman.

Roman Rivers is a famous movie star who is famous for playing a pirate hottie, but prefers to keep his personal life very cool indeed.  Particularly because that helps keep his young half-sister protected and out of the spotlight.  

Chloe becomes Roman's chef.  Sorta.  Sparks fly.  His best friend doesn't like her.  His half-sister adores her.  Bunnies erupt everywhere.  (Not even joking -- there are a lot of bunnies in this book.)  Grits and ice cream and latte art abound.  It's a jolly time.

Also, this is SPOILAGE, but there is NO third-act break-up.  I repeat: zero breaking up over nonsensical and contrived "problems" occurs.  So refreshing.  I want to hug B. R. Goodwin super tightly for that one.  END OF SPOILERS.

Grits and Glamor kind of ties together Goodwin's two Christian romcom series, Sugartree Romance and Happy in Honey Hill.  I loved that.  I've read a book or two from each series, so it was really fun to see characters from them pop up in this.

I really appreciate how Goodwin doesn't write perfect characters or cliched ones.  Her Christians walk the good walk and fight the good fight, and they know how to talk the good talk, too.  But they aren't perfect.  Nor do they stew in their own sinfulness and say it's just "human nature."  They make mistakes, and they learn from them.  They sin and stumble and stray, repent, forgive and are forgiven, and move forward in redemption.  That's too hard to find in Christian fiction.  That's what makes Goodwin's books must-reads for me, even though romcoms are not a genre I routinely gravitate toward.

Particularly Good Bits:

Being loved fully by the people in your little world who matter most has a way of erasing the background noise of voices suggesting you deserve otherwise (p. 213).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for a lot of kissing and lightly described makeouts, talk of needing to set physical boundaries so they can keep their bodies and minds pure, and discussions of appreciating people of the opposite sex.  It's tasteful, but not something I would hand a tween.

"Setting Time Free" by Sarah Everest

Each installment in the Untouched serial series is more taut and exciting than the last!

Breaking Triviality was a fun adventure.  Sifting Through Chaos turned serious fast.  And Setting Time Free was so suspenseful that I read the second half of the book in one sitting!

In this third and final installment, modern-day teens Marit and Cas are still trying to help 1940s Dutch teen Anneliese and a few new friends survive in newly occupied Rotterdam.  The Nazis have overrun the city and are an ever-present menace.  Anneliese's new friend Bastiaan and his resistance buddies try to help Marit and Cas find the mysterious locket that could return them to their own time.  But there are enemies on all sides, more even than Marit and Cas really realize.

Even more so than Sifting Through Chaos, this book brought to life the heartbreak and horror of war.  There are on-page deaths and some realistic descriptions of the struggle to find food and remain humane in the midst of scrabbling for survival.

As a whole, this serialized trilogy is a thrilling, suspenseful adventure story for teens that I very much enjoyed.

This book releases on Tuesday, August 11. I was privileged to be selected to read an advance copy from the publisher, but I was not requested or required to review the book; all opinions are my own.

Particularly Good Bits:

It was as though someone had cut a hole in my stomach and pulled everything out, leaving me a hollow cocoon, my butterfly soul having flown off to chase the light of my handsome prince (Marit, chapter four).

It would have been easy to slip back into the fearful girl I had once been, but I was not that girl anymore.  I had walked through the fire and felt the devil nipping at my heels.  And despite all the evil we had witnessed, the words Betje had sent us off with rang true.  The Lord was with us, no matter how dark the night (Annelies, chapter eight).

He had stepped out of the pages of my life as quickly as he had entered them, leaving the story unfinished (Annelies, chapter seventeen).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for wartime violence, including on-page shootings and death.  No cussing or smut.

"Farewell, My Lovely" by Raymond Chandler

Raymond Chandler's crisp, laconic, sharp, caustic, dazzlingly evocative writing is always good for what ails me.  Especially when what ails me is a mild case of summertime SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) and its accompanying discomfort in my own skin.

I try to limit myself to one Raymond Chandler book a year so that there is always enough time between my reading of any single book to make it feel fresh again with each reread.  So far, that's been working pretty well.

In Farewell, My Lovely, private investigator Philip Marlowe accidentally encounters an ex-con named Moose Malloy.  Moose is fresh out of prison and single-mindedly hunting for the love of his life, a singer named Velma.  He corrals Marlowe into helping him look for her, then accidentally commits a murder while trying to get information out of a black saloonkeeper.  Marlowe has to report the murder to the cops, but this is early 1940s California, and nobody really cares about an accidental murder of a black man who wasn't rich or famous or important in anyway.  Marlowe is told to forget about it, and the cops will track down Moose in their own good time.  The injustice bothers him, and he makes a lot of snide remarks about it to various authorities, to no real avail.

But Marlowe keeps getting sucked back into Moose's quest to find Velma.  Sometimes things happen to him that seem unconnected to Moose, like getting hit on the head and waking up to discover a murder, or getting hit on the head and waking up in a private hospital for recovering drug addicts.  But he starts to realize everything is all connected, eventually.  It feels for quite a while like a meandering spiral of a story, but that spiral is getting pulled tighter and tighter and tighter like a watch spring the whole time.

Particularly Good Bits:

I didn't say anything.  I lit my pipe again.  It makes you look thoughtful when you are not thinking (p. 91).

Aster Drive had a long smooth curve there and the houses on the inland side were just nice houses, but on the canyon side they were great silent estates, with twelve foot walls and wrought-iron gates and ornamental hedges; and inside, if you could get inside, a special brand of sunshine, very quiet, put up in noise-proof containers just for the upper classes (p. 119-120).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-16 for violence, including not-overly-detailed descriptions of some gory murders, as well as innuendo (mainly in dialog) here and there, some bad language, and the aforementioned casual racism and some racial slurs common in the era.  This is hardboiled detective fiction from the 1940s, so it's not actually smutty, but most of the characters Marlowe encounters are not nice people.

This has been my 6th book read and reviewed for my fifth Classics Club list.

"Secrets of the Revolution" by Megan Soja

This second book in the Harbor of Spies series by Megan Soja did not disappoint!  It builds upon the first book, Spark of the Revolution, but could also be read as a stand-alone.  (But you do find out how the first book ends, if you care about spoilage.)

This book centers around William Abbott, older brother of the main female character of the first book.  His plans for the future entirely change with the receipt of a single letter, and he wholeheartedly embraces the Patriot cause as a result.  He stays in Boston and becomes a spy.

Along the way, he meets Hannah Pierce, who runs her aging father's apothecary shop.  Not only is she keeping her father's failing health and mind a secret, but she becomes involved in the growing Patriot spy ring as well.

And, of course, William and Hannah fall in love.

I especially enjoyed how many real historical people, places, and events Soja includes in this series.  And I appreciate how the Christian faith of both main characters grew and changed over the course of the book.  I liked book two even better than book one, and I'm glad I'm only halfway through the series, because that means I still have two books to look forward to!

Particularly Good Bits:

Silence hovered between them, begging to be filled (p. 29).

"Perhaps many memories hold a touch of the bittersweet, but I believe that makes them all the more precious.  They remind us of the experiences that shaped us.  And in recognizing how fleeting and fragile life is, they spur us on to fully live each day that God gives us" (p. 91).

It was not a failure to close one chapter of her life and begin another (p. 276).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG for sweet romance including lightly described kisses, plus some descriptions of mild violence.  No cussing or smut.

This has been my 7th book read for my #RevolutionaryWarReads challenge!

Top Ten Tuesday: Have We Met?

This week's Top Ten Tuesday subject from That Artsy Reader Girl is "Books I want to read by new-to-me authors."  So, here are ten books that I have on my physical TBR shelves that are by authors I haven't read anything by before.

Since I haven't read these, I'm grabbing publication years and genre info from their Goodreads pages, and linking their titles to their Goodreads listings in case you are interested in learning more about them.

Boundless by Amy Caldwell -- 2023, Christian, contemporary, clean romance, ranch, modern cowboys

The Weight of Air by Kimberly Duffy -- 2023, Christian, historical fiction, circus performers, clean romance

Not Quite Miss Austen by Kim Griffin -- 2025, Christian, historical fiction, 1950s, clean romance

Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome -- 1889, classic, British lit, humor, travel

Passing by Nella Larsen -- 1929, classic, African American fiction, New York City

The Lady and the Loyalist by Stephanie McRae -- 2024, Christian, historical fiction, American Revolution, clean romance

Parnassus on Wheels by Christopher Morley -- 1917, classic, humor, New England, book-lover main character

The Betrayal of Eden by Erin Phillips -- 2025, Christian, young adult, fantasy, retelling of The Count of Monte Cristo

Freckles by Gene Stratton Porter -- 1904, classic, young adult, Indiana swamp

The Moonstone's Curse by Sam Siciliano -- 2017, mystery, historical fiction, Sherlock Holmes pastiche

That's my list for this week!  Have you read anything by these authors?  Do any of these titles catch your eye too?  Did you do a Top Ten Tuesday post this week?  Let me know in the comments!