AUGUST BOOK SELECTION: The Grand Scheme by Kathy Herman

Things couldn’t be better for Rue Kessler. He finally married the mother of his eight-year-old son and now has the family he’s always dreamed of. Not only that, his father-in-law hired him to be the new construction supervisor on a big condo project. He’s been sober for eighteen months. He’s plugged in at church. And he’s building his new bride the house she’s always dreamed of. Life is good.

While Rue is relishing his blessings, an environmentalist group called SAGE (Save All God’s Earth) comes to Jacob’s Ear and demonstrates in the city park, ruffling the feathers of some local retailers who fear the group’s protesting will run off tourists. When SAGE’s president is attacked and left for dead, an arson fire is set and an anonymous caller claims SAGE is responsible. That sets off a rash of retaliatory attacks, and Rue, his family, and his in-laws become targets of vicious acts that seem far more personal.

While Rue’s head is still reeling, a man on his work crew is found half dead in Tanner Canyon. Is SAGE trying to put a stop to condo project? Are the attacks even related?

Or is something more sinister afoot—something that will take all the faith he’s got to confront?

Based on James 3:16, “For when you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice,” this story will keep you turning those pages till the wee hours of the morning. Catch up on your sleep!

(Description found on: www.kathyherman.com)

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OOPS! So sorry I'm late posting the book selection! I don't know how time slipped by. Anyway, this is the last in the series. Next month we'll dive into something different. Enjoy!

July Selection: Never Look Back by Kathy Herman

Forgiveness is one thing, but who really forgets? Ivy Griffith has been released from jail after serving time for covering up the strangulation death of a high school classmate ten years earlier. She’s paid her debt to society. Kicked her drug habit. She’s making a fresh start. Problem is, everyone in her hometown of Jacob’s Ear, Colorado, knows what she did. And her seven-year-old son, Montana, won’t stop probing about the father he has never met–the man Ivy was too stoned to even remember. Plagued by her own shame and her little boy’s cries for male affirmation, Ivy is thrilled when Rue Kessler takes an interest in Montana and her. Maybe, just maybe, he’s the answer to prayer she’s been waiting for. But Rue has a shadow hanging over his past and is suspected in a rash of bizarre, brutal beatings. He denies any involvement, and Ivy believes him–until she discovers he and Montana have kept a secret from her. At a loss for what to believe or where to turn, Ivy’s on the verge of despair and wonders if even God has given up on her. Or is something bigger at play here–something being orchestrated outside of her control that’s about to bring down the curtain on everything including her past?

(description from www.kathyherman.com)

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Sorry I was so late posting this! I know of 5 of us reading the 1st book in this series and wanting to keep reading the series, so we're continuing on our adventure! But, we gotta start talking about it on the blog instead of the phone! haha

Alternate June Reading

Ever Present Danger by Kathy Herman

So..I wasn't willing (or able) to pay $17 for the hardback of Long Way Gone (this months selection) and the paperback isn't coming out until late August AND the library doesn't carry it! I'm determined to only have selections that are available at the library. But, if you are already reading Long Way Gone, obviously enjoy yourself!

I am really liking this book, Ever Present Danger. I'm going to read the 3 books in this series. You can find out about the author and the other books in this series, as well as the other ones, on her website. http://www.kathyherman.com/ They are available at my library, so hopefully they are available at yours, too!

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Here is the description of this book:

Twenty-eight-year-old Ivy Griffith comes back to the little town of Jacob’s Ear, Colorado after ten years of popping in and out of drug rehab in Denver and carrying around a secret from high school that could send her and three of her friends to prison if she ever decided to tell.

Wrought with guilt, she knows admitting the truth is the only way to be set free, but mustering the courage to confess what she knows to the sheriff won’t be easy, especially when it will mean that everyone else in town will find out—including her unsuspecting parents.

But when circumstances take a sudden, bizarre turn, and her three guilty friends are taken out of the scenario, Ivy must decide if telling the truth even matters if no one can corroborate what really happened. Of course, someone else CAN—someone she least expects—and that’s what will make this one a nail biter!

This story is based on I Corinthians 15:33, “Do not be misled: bad company corrupts good character”—and is guaranteed NOT to put you to sleep!

(description from www.kathyherman.com)

May's VBC Selection is:

The Shack By William P. Young

Synopsis

Mackenzie Allen Philips’ youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation, and evidence that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four years later in the midst of his Great Sadness, Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting him back to that shack for a weekend. Against his better judgment he arrives at the shack on a wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare. What he finds there will change Mack's world forever.

(description from www.amazon.com)

The April VBC Selection is: Beautiful Boy By David Sheff

From as early as grade school, the world seemed to be on Nic Sheff's string. Bright and athletic, he excelled in any setting and appeared destined for greatness. Yet as childhood exuberance faded into teenage angst, the precocious boy found himself going down a much different path. Seduced by the illicit world of drugs and alcohol, he quickly found himself caught in the clutches of addiction. Beautiful Boy is Nic's story, but from the perspective of his father, David. Achingly honest, it chronicles the betrayal, pain, and terrifying question marks that haunt the loved ones of an addict. Many respond to addiction with a painful oath of silence, but David Sheff opens up personal wounds to reinforce that it is a disease, and must be treated as such. Most importantly, his journey provides those in similar situations with a commodity that they can never lose: hope. --Dave Callanan

(description found on www.amazon.com)

The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan

Synopsis

"The Middle Place is about calling home. Instinctively. Even when all the paperwork—a marriage license, a notarized deed, two birth certificates, and seven years of tax returns—clearly indicates you're an adult, but all the same, there you are, clutching the phone and thanking God that you're still somebody's daughter."

For Kelly Corrigan, family is everything.

At thirty-six, she had a marriage that worked, a couple of funny, active kids, and a weekly newspaper column. But even as a thriving adult, Kelly still saw herself as George Corrigan's daughter. A garrulous Irish-American charmer from Baltimore, George was the center of the ebullient, raucous Corrigan clan. He greeted every day by opening his bedroom window and shouting, "Hello, World!" Suffice it to say, Kelly's was a colorful childhood, just the sort a girl could get attached to.

Kelly lives deep within what she calls the Middle Place—"that sliver of time when parenthood and childhood overlap"—comfortably wedged between her adult duties and her parents' care. But she's abruptly shoved into a coming-of-age when she finds a lump in her breast—and gets the diagnosis no one wants to hear. And so Kelly's journey to full-blown adulthood begins. When George, too, learns he has late-stage cancer, it is Kelly's turn to take care of the man who had always taken care of her—and show us a woman as she finally takes the leap and grows up.

Kelly Corrigan is a natural-born storyteller, a gift you quickly recognize as her father's legacy, and her stories are rich with everyday details. She captures the beat of an ordinary life and the tender, sometimes fractious moments that bind families together. Rueful and honest, Kelly is the prized friend who will tell you her darkest, lowest, screwiest thoughts, and then later, dance on the coffee table at your party.

Funny, yet heart-wrenching, The Middle Place is about being a parent and a child at the same time. It is about the special double-vision you get when you are standing with one foot in each place. It is about the family you make and the family you came from—and locating, navigating, and finally celebrating the place where they meet. It is about reaching for life with both hands—and finding it.

*synopsis found on the Barnes & Noble website