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Saturday, November 10, 2018

Pistachio Pudding. Quick and Easy Dessert

I am a huge fan of quick and easy desserts. Especially when I have to take something to potlucks. The recipe I'm about to share with you as a family favorite. My Aunt Barb would always make this and I would gobble it up. I finally have mastered it. So now I am sharing the recipe with you.


What you will need

1 box of pistachio pudding
1 can (normal size) crushed pineapple
1 tub cool whip
1 10 oz bag mini marshmallow



Open pudding mix and pineapple.

Blend together.

 Once well blended add cool whip and stir together

Gradually add marshmallows

Place in container and chill for at leaat an hour (overnight is best)

Recipe is courtesy of my Aunt Barb ❤

The Light Before Day by Suzanne Woods Fisher Review and Giveaway On tour with Celebrate Lit

The Light Before Day FB Banner_edited-1


About the Book

The Light Before Day-Book Cover

Book: The Light Before Day
Author: Suzanne Woods Fisher
Genre: Historical Fiction
Release Date: October 2, 2018
“Henry, this . . . fortune, this sudden wealth . . . I fear it will change our lives. And I don’t want my life to change.”
After three years on a whaling voyage, Henry Macy returns to Nantucket to news that his grandmother has passed, bequeathing her vast fortune to him and his sister, Hitty. And it was truly vast. But Lillian Coffin was no fool. The inheritance comes with a steep cost, including when each should marry and whom—a Quaker in good standing, of course. But if they relinquish the inheritance, it all goes to Tristram Macy, their father’s thieving business partner.
As Hitty and Henry seek a way to satisfy the will’s conditions, they’ll be faced with obstacles on every side—and it may be that Lillian Coffin will have the last word after all.

Click here to purchase your copy!

The light of day buy 1 get 1
Find out more about this amazing deal at http://www.suzannewoodsfisher.com/thelightbeforeday

About the Author

suzanne woods fisher
Suzanne Woods Fisher is an award-winning, bestselling author of more than two dozen novels, including Phoebe’s Light and Minding the Light, as well as the Amish Beginnings, The Bishop’s Family, and The Inn at Eagle Hill series. She has also written several nonfiction books about the Amish, including Amish Peace and The Heart of the Amish. Fisher lives in California. Learn more at www.suzannewoodsfisher.com and follow her on Twitter @suzannewfisher and Facebook @SuzanneWoodsFisherAuthor.

Guest Post from Suzanne

The Mortgage Button
In each story of the ‘Nantucket Legacy’ series, there’s a reference to a mortgage button in the newel post of a stairway. Phoebe Starbuck, the main character in Phoebe’s Light, made a point to notice it in the captain’s house on Orange Street, the famous residences of sea captains. In Minding the Light, Daphne Coffin touched the mortgage button on the newel post of her horrible mother’s grand house each and every morning. Hitty and Henry Macy were well aware of the absence of their childhood home’s mortgage button—and all that its absence symbolized—in The Light Before Day.
Mortgage buttons meant something to each of those characters. It made a statement to anyone who walked into a house.
Have you ever seen a mortgage button? It’s a very Nantucket-y tradition. In fact, some say the mortgage button originated on Nantucket Island, thirty miles out to sea.
Supposedly, when a house’s mortgage was fully paid and there were no liens against the property, the homeowner drilled a hole in the newel post of the main staircase, rolled up the mortgage document, put it inside, and capped the hole with a decorative plug of scrimshaw.
Scrimshaw is a term for an American folk art developed during the 18th and 19th centuries. Whaling in New England was an industry that lifted Nantucket Island to become the world’s wealthiest port. After a whale’s oil was rendered, the ship’s captain would give his crew the sperm whale’s teeth or bones to carve during long tedious hours at sea. Whaling had its exciting moments, but they were far and few between. As a pastime, sailors carved all kinds of useful gifts to bring home to their loved ones: needles, combs, games, clothespins, busks…and mortgage buttons.
But let’s jump back to the mortgage button. Some legends say that the actual mortgage papers were ceremoniously burned and the ashes stashed inside the drilled hole before sealed with the button. However, as appealing a thought as that might be, it is most likely a myth. There’s never been any evidence of ashes or even hidden mortgages found in salvaged newel posts. Still, mortgage buttons are common among Nantucket homes, and the tradition has spread to other parts of the country. In southern states, for example, they’re called brag buttons. Whether myth or truth, today it’s more a matter of a charming nostalgic custom than a nod to your healthy (or…not so healthy) net worth.

My Thoughts

This is the third book in the Nantucket Legacy series. I have enjoyed each and every one. The author always manages to craft such unique and captivating stories. In book two we saw Henry and Hitty as little kids. In book three this is their story, They have such a wonderful brother and sister relationship. After Henry returns from a whaling voyage he discovers that his grandmother has passed. He and his sister have inherited a fortune. However there are restrictions on the inheritance. Can they meet the requirements in order to secure it? You will have to find out for yourself. 

I received a copy of this book through the Celebrate Lit blogging program. All thoughts are my own. 

Blog Stops

The Avid Reader, November 4
Texas Book-aholic, November 5
Godly Book Reviews, November 5
Among the Reads, November 8
Blogging With Carol, November 9
Mary Hake, November 10
Carpe Diem, November 11
Simple Harvest Reads, November 12
Janices book reviews, November 13
Captive Dreams, November 14
Bigreadersite, November 14
By The Book, November 15
Pause for Tales, November 16
Book by Book, November 16
Have A Wonderful Day, November 17
Bibliophile Reviews, November 17

Giveaway

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To celebrate her tour, Suzanne is giving away a grand prize of a $50 Amazon gift card!!
Be sure to comment on the blog stops for nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter. https://promosimple.com/ps/d773/the-light-before-day-celebration-tour-giveaway


Wednesday, November 7, 2018

Book Review and Giveaway! An hour unspent by Roseanna M. White on tour with Celebrate Lit

About the Book

An Hour Unspent
Once London’s top thief, Barclay Pearce has turned his back on his life of crime and now uses his skills for a nation at war. But not until he rescues a clockmaker’s daughter from a mugging does he begin to wonder what his future might hold.
Evelina Manning has constantly fought for independence but she certainly never meant for it to inspire her fiancé to end the engagement and enlist in the army. When the intriguing man who saved her returns to the Manning residence to study clockwork repair with her father, she can’t help being interested. But she soon learns that nothing with Barclay Pearce is as simple as it seems.
As 1915 England plunges ever deeper into war, the work of an ingenious clockmaker may give England an unbeatable military edge—and Germany realizes it as well. Evelina’s father soon finds his whole family in danger—and it may just take a reformed thief to steal the time they need to escape it.

Click here to purchase your copy!

About the Author


Roseanna 2018 
Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award nominated author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary. You can learn more about her and her stories at www.RoseannaMWhite.com.

Guest Post from Roseanna

Last year, as I finished up the writing of An Hour Unspent, my great-grandmother passed away at the age of 103. As I sat at her funeral service and listened to the heartfelt memorial raised up to her by her kids and grandkids, I realized anew that this woman had been a matriarch in the truest sense of the word. She’d taught my family for generations how to love the Lord and each other, how to serve the Lord and each other, and how to trust the Lord and each other. Grandma Seward was, in so many ways, the one who instilled in me my idea of what family really is.
That idea—that it’s those knit together by love more than blood, and that faith is the strongest foundation—is what I built my unusual family of thieves upon in the Shadows Over England series. And strange as it is to liken my twenty-something reformed-thief hero to my 103-year-old-grandmother, Barclay Pearce is very much to his family what Maxine Seward was to mine.
The founder. The caregiver. The leader.
I knew as I began the series that I would write about Barclay in book three, and as I got to know him better throughout the series, I grew so excited to share his story! This is a man who led his family first into and then out of a life a crime, always for the right reasons—so he could provide for the children under his care. All he ever wanted to do was give them what he himself had lost. To show them love. To prove to them that they were worth any sacrifice.
It was truly a blessing for me to get to write the story in which Barclay found someone to come alongside him, to appreciate and learn to understand him. To finally share what started him down this path. I loved the idea that only a reformed thief could steal the time another family needed to overcome their own trials.
There are many historical items in the book that were such fun to explore—watchmaking of the era, the suffrage movement in England, technological advancements of the war—but at the heart, this isn’t a story about any of those.
It’s a story about how far people should go for love. I hope you enjoy Barclay’s story as much as I did!

My Thoughts

First and foremost, I am a huge fan of this author. I was super excited to see another book in this series. I could not wait to get my hands on it. This is my favorite book that I have read by this author. I kept turning pages to see what happened next. Barclay finally got his own story! I loved how it played out! He is such a perfect main character.  I loved the family angle that this story presented. The characters are well written, the storyline is well developed and you WILL NOT Be dissapointed. The author has done careful research and has brought history to life. 

I received a copy of this book through the Celebrate Lit Blogging Program, All thoughts are my own. 

Blog Stops

The Avid ReaderOctober 30
The Power of WordsOctober 30
Back Porch ReadsOctober 30
Kat’s Corner BooksOctober 30
Faithfully BookishOctober 31
Genesis 5020October 31
Fiction AficionadoNovember 1
Among the ReadsNovember 1
The Lit AddictNovember 1
Just the Write EscapeNovember 1
MultifariousNovember 2
Godly Book ReviewsNovember 2
Madeline ClarkNovember 2
Christian BookaholicNovember 3
Bookworm MamaNovember 3
BigreadersiteNovember 3
Blogging With Carol , November 4
D’S QUILTS & BOOKSNovember 4
Life with the Tribe, November 4
The Becca FilesNovember 4
Kathleen DenlyNovember 5
Cordially BarbaraNovember 5
Simple Harvest ReadsNovember 5 (Guest Post from Mindy Houng)
All-of-a-kind MomNovember 6
Faery Tales Are RealNovember 6
Carpe DiemNovember 6
Margaret KazmierczakNovember 7
Blossoms and Blessings , November 7
Maureen’s Musings , November 8
Book by BookNovember 8
Just CommonlyNovember 8
cherylbbookblogNovember 9
Have A Wonderful Day , November 9
With a Joyful NoiseNovember 9
KarenSueHadley , November 10
Tell Tale Book ReviewsNovember 10
Baker kellaNovember 10
Bibliophile ReviewsNovember 10
Inklings and Notions , November 11
Two Points of InterestNovember 11
Henry HappensNovember 12
Texas Book-aholicNovember 12

Giveaway

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To celebrate her tour, Roseanna is giving away a grand prize of a signed book, a London mug, and a 48-pack Twinings tea sampler!!
Be sure to comment on the blog stops for nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter. https://promosimple.com/ps/d570/an-hour-unspent-celebration-tour-giveaway

Book Review: Shotguns and Stagecoaches: The Brave Men Who Rode for Wells Fargo in the Wild West By: JOHN BOESSENECKER

Shotguns and Stagecoaches: The Brave Men Who Rode for Wells Fargo in the Wild West






ABOUT THE BOOK:




The true stories of the Wild West heroes who guarded the iconic Wells Fargo stagecoaches and trains, battling colorful thieves, vicious highwaymen, and robbers armed with explosives.


The phrase "riding shotgun" was no teenage game to the men who guarded stagecoaches and trains the Western frontier. Armed with sawed-off, double-barreled shotguns and an occasional revolver, these express messengers guarded valuable cargo through lawless terrain. They were tough, fighting men who risked their lives every time they climbed into the front boot of a Concord coach.

Boessenecker introduces soon-to-be iconic personalities like "Chips" Hodgkins, an express rider known for his white mule and his ability to outrace his competitors, and Henry Johnson, the first Wells Fargo detective. Their lives weren't just one shootout after another—their encounters with desperadoes were won just as often with quick wits and memorized-by-heart knowledge of the land.

The highway robbers also get their due. It wouldn't be a book about the Wild West without Black Bart, the most infamous stagecoach robber of all time, and Butch Cassidy's gang, America's most legendary train robbers.

Through the Gold Rush and the early days of delivery with horses and saddlebags, to the heyday of stagecoaches and huge shipments of gold, and finally the rise of the railroad and the robbers who concocted unheard-of schemes to loot trains, Wells Fargo always had courageous men to protect its treasure. Their unforgettable bravery and ingenuity make this book a thrilling read.
 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Boessenecker

JOHN BOESSENECKER is considered one of the leading authorities on crime and lawlessness in the Old West. He is the award-winning author of Bandido: The Life and Times of Tiburcio Vasquez and When Law Was in the Holster: The Frontier Life of Bob Paul. In 2011 and 2013, True West magazine named Boessenecker Best Nonfiction Writer. He has appeared frequently as a historical commentator on PBS, The History Channel, A&E, and others. He lives in San Francisco, California.

MY THOUGHTS

I love reading about the Wild West and all the adventures that go along with it. This book is a great one to read. The author has done great and careful research. The way that he presents the information is captivating. I loved hearing about the true stories and what they went through to transport the money. I am a huge fan of people's history.

This is a great read for anyone that is interested in the Wild West or People's History. I enjoyed this book

Many thanks to NetGalley and the Publisher St. Martin's Press for allowing me to read this book. 

Saturday, November 3, 2018

Book Review: The Cumberland Bride by Shannon McNear


About the Book 
Thomas Bledsoe and Kate Gruener are traveling the Wilderness Road when conflicts between natives and settlers reach a peak that will require each of them to tap into a well of courage.
A brand new series for fans of all things related to history, romance, adventure, faith, and family trees.


Love and Adventure Are Discovered on the Wilderness Road
In 1794, when Kate Gruener’s father is ready to move the family farther west into the wilderness to farm untouched land, Kate is eager to live out her own story of adventure like he did during the War for Independence and to see untamed lands. And she sets her sights on learning more about their scout, Thomas Bledsoe. Thomas’s job is to get settlers safely across the Kentucky Wilderness Road to their destination while keeping an ear open for news of Shawnee unrest. But naïve Kate’s inquisitive nature could put them both in the middle of a rising tide of conflict. Is there more to Thomas’s story than he is willing to tell? Is there an untapped courage in Kate that can thwart a coming disaster?

Join the adventure as the Daughters of the Mayflower series continues with The Cumberland Bride by Shannon McNear

About the Author
Shannon McNear

After more than two decades in the South, Shannon McNear now makes her home on the windy northern plains with her husband, four of their eight children, two German Shepherds, four cats, several chickens, and a noisy flock of guinea fowl. She serves in worship and youth ministry, and has been writing novel-length fiction since age 15. Her first novella, Defending Truth, from A Pioneer Christmas Collection, was a 2014 RITA® nominee.

When not sewing, researching, or leaking story from her fingertips, she enjoys being outdoors, basking in the beauty of the Dakota prairies'

Find out more and see other books at: http://www.shannonmcnear.com

My Thoughts:
This is a newer author to me. I had read her story, The counterfeit Tory which was part of the Backcountry Bride series. I was excited to read her first full length novel. The Cumberland Bride by Shannon McNear, and the fifth installment of the Daughters of the Mayflower series is outstanding. I have read all the other ones in the series and have been loving it. This is set in 1794 which is not a time period that I read a lot about. The author has created some amazing characters. This is well written, leaving me speechless and re-reading the twists and turns. The author has created a masterpiece with this story. Her descriptions and careful research lead you on a wondeful journey. 

I received a copy of this book through Barbour publishing. All thoughts are my own.