Books, Movies, and Chinese Food

Summary from BN .com: When Catharine Olsen leaves Holland for Wyoming as a mail-order bride, she brings some extra baggage with her: two sisters, her mother's set of Blue Willow china, and a tragic past. As she steps off the train, Peter Andersen is glad to see that she is everything her letters showed her to be. But he is a bit perturbed by her unexpected companions. How will he support them all? And what other secrets might Catharine be keeping from him? Filled with sweet romance and vivid characters, Deeply Devoted highlights a clash of cultures as a highborn European and a simple wheat farmer learn to love one another and trust God with the past--and the future. I really don't think I am a romance reader anymore. While I was never a huge fan of the genre, I found most Christian historical romances enjoyable in the past. Lately though, I feel like the stories are making me jaded. I'm not enjoying them the way I used to. Unfortunately this book falls into that cat...

April McBride has suffered a broken engagement once before and fully intends to guard her heart when she travels to Lewistown, Montana, to attend her brother's wedding. One look around the small mining town convinces April that this won't be difficult—just a bunch of dusty shops, bad service, and ill-bred cowboys. But a run-in with a horse trainer named Wes Owen opens up vast possibilities for frustration, embarrassment, friendship, and . . . love? Can April and Wes see past their differences in order to envision a future together? As with the other books in this series, this story is more of a historical romance than historical fiction. The historical background is just the setting for the story with the characters acting in the manner of the time period without any actual history coinciding with the plot. April travels out west to be with her brother at his wedding and then decides to stay in the small town even though she is a big city girl. She has a rough time a...

Set in 1890s Montana, The Jewel of His Heart finds Juliana drawn to a handsome, gentle sheepherder--but sparks fly when he considers mining, the occupation that lured her father away from his family. Both Josh and Juliana must make a choice--the world's riches and promises, or the eternal value of love. To me in this type of historical fiction, the actual "historical" part seems to take a backseat to the rest of the story. Other than the obvious details, this story could have very well taken place in a modern day setting with the same results. The historical setting just takes the reader back to a simpler time where life was harder and situations such as this were more cherished. Juliana is a young woman, who due to the death of her mother, has to take her life into her own hands and lands a job in a newspaper office. From there, she discovers more about life around the town and it helps to fuel her relationship with Josh. It was fun seeing the going-ons about the...