Showing posts with label I Read with Audra Book Tour. Show all posts
Showing posts with label I Read with Audra Book Tour. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 21, 2022

Midnight’s Budding Morrow by Carolyn Miller (Blog Tour and GIVEAWAY)

 


Do you consider yourself to be a “wallflower” or are you more the life of the party?

Midnight’s Budding Morrow is the second book in the Regency Wallflowers series.  I read and enjoyed the first book as well.  This book can be read as a standalone.

Sarah Drayton is invited by her friend Beatrice to visit her family estate, the run-down castle of Langley which is located by the sea.  Sarah hopes they do not run into Beatrice’s brother, James, who is a drunken rake that had forced a kiss on her at a dance.  Sarah finds things not happy at the castle as it fallen into disrepair and the servants don’t seem to be doing much work.  Beatrice is unhappy as she is in love with a man that her father does not approve.  Sarah soon finds herself in a marriage of convenience with the dreaded James.  Will Sarah be able to find happiness?

I enjoyed this novel.  I love marriage of convenience stories.  I really liked how this book delved into whether a person can really change or not.  James has what would now be PTSD from his service for the crown in the Napoleonic Wars.  He finds God and works through his demons while recovering and wants to start afresh with Sarah.  It’s hard to make true changes and start over with a spouse that you barely know. 

Sarah is an orphan and looking for family and a place to belong.  Old Mr. Langley enjoys her skills running a household, but neighbors look at Sarah more as a servant than the lady of the house.  Will she find her place in the household, neighborhood, and with her husband?

The novel has some slight Gothic elements.  Nothing scary, but it did have a treasure hunt, shut up rooms, a falling down castle, and the mysterious death of old Mrs. Langley years before.

Overall, Midnight’s Budding Morrow is an intriguing regency romance.

Book Source:  Review Copy from Kregel Publications as part of the Audra Jennings PR Book Tour.

About the series:

While most stories set in Regency England focus on the rich, the young, and the beautiful, award-winning author Carolyn Miller decided she wanted to give readers something different for a change. Her new Regency Wallflowers series follows the commoners, away from the hustle and bustle of 1810s London, out in the Lake District of England. She tells the stories of women who are slightly older and have few prospects for marriage, women who might be considered “wallflowers.”

Midnight’s Budding Morrow is the second book in the Regency Wallflowers series. The first book in the series is Dusk’s Darkest Shores.

 


About the book:

Can real love grow between a wallflower and an unrepentant rogue?

Sarah Drayton is eager to spend time with her best friend at her crumbling Northumberland castle estate. Matrimony is the last thing on her mind and the last thing she expects to be faced with on a holiday. Yet she finds herself being inveigled into a marriage of convenience with her friend's rakish brother.

When James Langley returns to his family's estate, he can't be bothered to pay attention to his responsibilities as the heir. War is raging and he wants only distraction, not serious tethers. But his roguish ways have backed him into a corner, and he has little choice but to obey his father's stunning decree: marry before returning to war, or else. Suddenly he finds himself wedded to a clever and capable woman he does not love.

Sarah craves love and a place to belong, neither of which James offered before returning to the battlefront. Now everyone around her thinks she married above her station, and they have no intention of rewarding her for such impertinence. It isn't until her husband returns from war seemingly changed that she begins to hope they may find real happiness. But can she trust that this rake has truly reformed?

When tragedy strikes, this pair must learn to trust God and his plans. Will they be destroyed . . . or will they discover that even in the darkest depths of night, the morning still holds hope?

 Click here to read an excerpt.

 

About the author:



Carolyn Miller is an inspirational romance author who lives in the beautiful Southern Highlands of New South Wales, Australia, with her husband and four children.

A longtime lover of romance, especially that of Jane Austen and Georgette Heyer’s Regency era, Carolyn holds a BA in English literature and loves drawing readers into fictional worlds that show the truth of God’s grace in our lives. She enjoys music, films, gardens, art, travel, and food.

Miller’s novels have won a number of RWA and ACFW contests. She is a member of American Christian Fiction Writers and Australasian Christian Writers.

Learn more about Carolyn at www.carolynmillerauthor.com, or find her on Facebook (Carolyn Miller Author)Instagram (@CarolynMillerAuthor), and Twitter (@CarolynMAuthor)

GIVEAWAY:



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Tuesday, April 26, 2022

Shadows in the Mind’s Eye by Janyre Tromp (Book Tour and GIVEAWAY

 

Annie and Sam were childhood sweethearts, but after Sam has returned from the Pacific Theatre of WWII, he is changed man.  As he tries to fit back in on the farm in the rural Arkansas mountains and get to know his young daughter, Rosie, he starts to see things on the farm that no one else does.  Who is visiting the farm or is it just the ghosts of his troubled mind?  As people begin to question his sanity, will Sam be able to save his family?  Annie came from a well to do family, but the wealth comes from her father’s illegal activities.  What happened to Annie’s mother?  Will Annie be able to reconnect with Sam?

I really liked the unique plot and setting of this novel.  I liked that it was set after WWII and covered PTSD in the returning soldiers.  In the author’s note at the end, Tromp states that she based it on talks with her grandparents.  I also haven’t read too many books set in Arkansas and I liked it.  I didn’t know that Hot Springs was a den of mob activity back in the day.  I thought it was all very fascinating.

The novel is told in alternating chapters between Annie and Sam’s viewpoints.  The story is a slow build as we get to know Sam, Annie, their family and friends, but the ending is very action packed.  I couldn’t put the book down once I reached a certain point!

Favorite Quote:

“One thing I know for certain is that memory’s a slippery thing.  It changes and morphs, solidifying only at the insistence of the most powerful things.”

Overall, Shadows in the Mind’s Eye is a fascinating historical suspense novel.

Book Source:  A Review Copy from Kregel Publishing as part of the I Read With Audra Book Tour.  Thank-you! I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.


About the book:

“Tromp weaves a complex historical tale incorporating love, suspense, hurt, and healing—all the elements that keep the pages turning.”

~ Julie Cantrell, New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of Perennials


Charlotte Anne Mattas longs to turn back the clock. Before her husband, Sam, went to serve his country in the war, he was the man everyone could rely on—responsible, intelligent, and loving. But the person who’s come back to their family farm is very different from the protector Annie remembers. Sam’s experience in the Pacific theater has left him broken in ways no one can understand—but that everyone is learning to fear.

Tongues start wagging after Sam nearly kills his own brother. Now when he claims to have seen men on the mountain when no one else has seen them, Annie isn’t the only one questioning his sanity and her safety. If there were criminals haunting the hills, there should be evidence beyond his claims. Is he really seeing what he says, or is his war-tortured mind conjuring ghosts?

Annie desperately wants to believe her husband. But between his irrational choices and his nightmares leaking into the daytime, she’s terrified he’s going mad. Can she trust God to heal Sam’s mental wounds—or will sticking by him mean keeping her marriage at the cost of her own life?

Debut novelist Janyre Tromp delivers a deliciously eerie, Hitchcockian story filled with love and suspense. Readers of psychological thrillers and historical fiction by Jaime Jo Wright and Sarah Sundin will add Tromp to their favorite authors list.

To read an excerpt of Shadows in the Mind’s Eye, click here.


About the author 


Janyre Tromp (pronounced Jan-ear) is a historical suspense novelist who loves spinning tales that, at their core, hunt for beauty, even when it isn’t pretty. She’s the author of Shadows in the Mind’s Eye and coauthor of It’s a Wonderful Christmas.

 A firm believer in the power of an entertaining story, Tromp is also a book editor and published children’s book author. She lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan with her husband, two kids, two crazy cats, and a slightly eccentric Shetland Sheepdog.

 You can find her on Facebook (@JanyreTromp), Instagram (@JaynreTromp), Twitter (@JanyreTromp), and her website, www.JanyreTromp.com where you can download a free copy of her novella, Wide Open.

 



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