Reading

Top Ten Tuesday

/ kellyfbarr / 1 Comment

toptentuesday

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday theme is “Top Ten ALL TIME Favorite Books of X Genre” and I have decided to do the Romance genre. Now, this list includes books that aren’t “strictly” romance, but they all have romance in them. You can join Top Ten Tuesday too, just go to The Broke and the Bookish for all of the details.

My Top Ten Romance Books of All Time

Years ago, I read a lot of Harlequin Romance stories until I got tired of the predictability of them when I realized their plots were all basically the same. However, this book remains one very favorite Harlequin Romance book, and though I can’t really tell you much about it anymore, I do know that something about it made it stand out from all the rest to me. I hope to get a copy and re-read it soon.

2. 

If you’ve been following my TTT lists for long, you know that this book has popped up frequently. I LOVE this book!

3. Her Christmas Hero (Home to Dover Series Book 6) by [Beatty, Lorraine]

Apparently, this is Book 6 in a series called “Home to Dover”. I did not know that when I read it, and I have not read any of the other books in the series, as I have not read a lot of Love Inspired books, but earlier this year, I read three Love Inspired Romance stories and this one was fantastic! Lorraine Beatty did an excellent job creating characters that I cared about and routed for and came to love. I would love to read more about the characters in this story.

4. Love Unexpected (Beacons of Hope Book #1) by [Hedlund, Jody]

This is another book that has shown up on some of my other TTT lists. Again, I just love this book!

5. Kissed by a Cowboy (A Four of Hearts Ranch Romance) by [Clopton, Debra]

Again, this book is part of a series called the “Four of Hearts Ranch Romances”, and I have not read any of the other books in the series, but I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and it has also appeared on previous TTT lists of mine.

6. The Promise: A Novel by [Steel, Danielle]

I used to collect and read all of Danielle Steel’s novels, but over the years, I fell behind on my collection and on reading them. However, The Promise remains one of my all time favorites.

7. Safe Harbour by [Steel, Danielle]

I really enjoyed this Danielle Steel novel as well.

8. Love Comes Softly (Love Comes Softly Book #1) by [Oke, Janette]

This is the first book in a fantastic series by Janette Oke. I have also shared this series in other TTT lists.

9. Message in a Bottle by [Sparks, Nicholas],  A Walk to Remember by [Sparks, Nicholas] and 

Okay, okay, I know I’m cheating, but it’s so hard to just pick 10. These three books by Nicholas Sparks are wonderful, and in my opinion like in most books that have had movies based on them, I believe all of these books are better than the movies, especially A Walk to Remember. I believe that the movies of Message in a Bottle and The Notebook held to the books’ story lines fairly well, but there were things that I felt were important in A Walk to Remember that the movie changed, left out, or compromised.

10. 

Yes, my last pick is also another cheat, but this series is so phenomenal, that there is no way to choose just one of these books as the favorite of the series. Dee Henderson did such a great job of creating incredibly realistic, believable characters that I came to love and feel that I really knew in these books that I was heartbroken to come to the end of the series. I would still love to see Dee Henderson write more about this wonderful characters. I look forward to re-reading this series in the not-too-distant future.

What genre did you choose for your TTT this week?

TeaTime Talk

/ kellyfbarr / 4 Comments

Ladies' Christmas Tea 2011 033

I have decided to begin my own biweekly post that I hope you will participate in. I was really looking forward to participating in the Coffee Shop Chat posts that were started on the Christ is Write blog, but I noticed that they haven’t appeared very regularly. Therefore, I decided to take the idea, tweak it to make it my own, give it a new name, and hope that others will want to join me for TeaTime Talk every other Monday.

For the Rules and Guidelines, see my TeaTime Talk Page and join in the fun!  It’s really quite easy.

Things I am Currently Working On:

  1. I have begun our homeschooling year with our youngest son, the last one I have to finish teaching.
  2. I am helping to get the older two organized and prepared to leave home — the oldest will be returning to college for his sophomore year, the middle will be going to his first year of Bible training at a Bible school. The oldest is getting ready to wrap up his job as an intern at the public library and the middle will be leaving his position at a local fast food restaurant.
  3. With all of the busy schedules that are part of my first two things I am working on, I am finding it quite difficult to accomplish all of my writing goals, but here are the ones I am working on: Scheduling Blog Posts at least a month in advance to attempt to free up some time to work on other writing goals and revising and editing the chapters I have already completed on my current WIP to correct some things that I had historically inaccurate before receiving the information from a museum, as well as to add some things to the story that I believe will make it more interesting and complete the historical part of it.

Places Where I Did Some Writing This Week:

1. In the waiting room at the dentist’s office. I took my oldest son for his dental checkup and cleaning, and I took my notebook along and wrote some poems for my Thursday posts while I waited for him.

2. Since we were treated unkindly at the cafe we had enjoyed meeting in for quite some time, we have been meeting at a church. One of the ladies that is part of our little writers’ group attends that church and so when she wasn’t able to join us this week, we thought we’d try somewhere else. So, we went to the local Tropical Smoothie Cafe which really wasn’t conducive to writing, if you like it relatively quiet to write, because they had music playing quite loudly over the loudspeakers. So now we know another place we don’t want to go to write. It’s quite difficult to find good places to write, at least in the area we live in.

Conversation Starters:

1. If you’re a writer, what public places do you find comfortable and acceptable for writing?

2. What’s your favorite tea or coffee beverage in hot weather?

3. What part of the world do you call home?

4. Do you prefer dogs or cats? Why?

Top Ten Tuesday

/ kellyfbarr / 6 Comments

Today’s Theme as per The Broke and the Bookish is “Top Ten REWIND” where we can go back and do a topic we missed over the years or recently or a topic we really want to revisit. Therefore, since I have only been a Top Ten Tuesday participant since February 16, 2016, they have lots of great topics that I have missed, and so I have chosen to do “Ten Books I Just HAD to Buy . . . But Are Still Sitting on my Bookshelf”.

  1.  Hound Dog True by [Urban, Linda]

A fellow writing friend suggested I read this. She really feels it’s a great book for writers to read, so I purchased it with every intention of reading it “soon” (about a year ago), and still haven’t made the time to read it. I did pick it up and begin it one time, and I didn’t stop because there was anything wrong with it or because it didn’t hold my attention; it’s just that I was reading something else at the same time, and I just haven’t gotten back to it yet.

2.  The true story behind the popular TV series Sue Thomas:FBEYE. A deaf ...

I heard Sue Thomas speak in April 2016 and was so impressed with, amazed and inspired by this woman that I had to have the book that tells me more about her life story, but it still waits.

3.  If I Run (If I Run Series) by [Blackstock, Terri]

4.  Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore: A Novel by [Sloan, Robin]

5.  The Writing Circle (Voice) by [Demas, Corinne]

6.  The Last Storyteller: A Novel of Ireland by [Delaney, Frank]

7.   

8.  Fearless: A Novel by [Dellosso, Mike]

9 & 10. 16 Lighthouse Road (A Cedar Cove Novel) by [Macomber, Debbie]

I gave this book two spots because it is the first book in a series that consists of 12 books plus a cookbook and I bought the whole entire series (used and from a discount online bookseller) because I had seen one episode of the TV series based on this book series. I visited with my mom when she was in rehabilitation in a nursing home two years ago after heart surgery, and she had the TV on. When the show signed off and I saw the credit about it being based on this book series, I decided I would buy the book series to read because we don’t have TV, and in my opinion, the books are always better than a TV series or movie anyway.

Top Ten Tuesday

/ kellyfbarr / 15 Comments

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday list as suggested by The Broke and the Bookish is probably the easiest one I’ve ever done!  The hard part will be stopping at just 10.  🙂      The list is the “Top Ten Books I’d Buy Right This Second if Someone Handed my a Fully Loaded Gift Card”.

  1. The Shadow's Curse by [McCulloch, Amy]
  3. Kill Devil (Jed Patrick series Book 2) by [Dellosso, Mike]
  4. Thief of Lies (Library Jumpers) by [Drake, Brenda]
  5. Ice Massacre (Mermaids of Eriana Kwai Book 1) by [Warner, Tiana]
  6. Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children Book 1) by [Riggs, Ransom]
  7. The Outliers by [McCreight, Kimberly]
  8. All the Light We Cannot See: A Novel by [Doerr, Anthony]
  9. The Rogue Knight by [McClure, Marcia Lynn]

Of course, I love to read fiction, but there are times I need to or choose to read nonfiction. Now, most of my nonfiction usually has something to do with writing, and because I have and use Scrivener, but not anywhere close to completely, I really want the last book on this list so that I can use Scrivener to its fullest. I could have made a list of top ten fiction books as well as a list of top ten nonfiction/writing books I would buy right this second with a really loaded gift card!  😀

How about you? Do you prefer fiction or nonfiction and why?

Top Ten Tuesday

/ kellyfbarr / 3 Comments

Anyway, this week’s Top Ten Tuesday, according to The Broke and the Bookish is “Top Ten Things Books Have Made You Want to Do or Learn About After Reading Them”.  Being a homeschool mom, this is an easy list for me because we read books and then go to learn things because of what we’ve read.  🙂

  1. Two years ago, two of my sons had an assignment to write an historical fiction story, and my youngest decided to write a story about the Pony Express, so we read several books about the Pony Express. I can’t remember a specific book, but the books we read left me wanting to learn more and gave me my desire and idea to write the current novel I am working on, so I have done a lot more research and learned a lot more about the Pony Express.

2. Misty of Chincoteague by [Henry, Marguerite]

I read the entire series of Misty books by Marguerite Henry with my youngest son, and we loved them so much that we wanted to see Chincoteague and the ponies. So, I looked it up online and planned a vacation, and two years ago we went to Chincoteague and Assateague for a week. We saw the ponies and visited the Chincoteague Museum where we participated in a fun scavenger hunt and saw the family Bible of the Bebee family, the family who were the main characters of Marguerite Henry’s books. We found out that the Misty of Chincoteague series were true stories!

3. 423156

Our first year of homeschooling, I read this story with my two oldest sons, and it made us want to know more about horses. Therefore, we studied horses that year as well.

4. Sybil: The Classic True Story of a Woman Possessed by Sixteen Personalities

I saw the movie based on this book when I was a young teenager. It fascinated me. Being the first story of Multiple Personality Disorder many people didn’t believe it. When I got older, I read the book and still found MPD fascinating, so I did a little bit of studying about it. It is a very real issue for some people. It’s just quite rare.

5. A Girl of the Limberlost (Limberlost, #2)

I read this book just a couple of years ago and it taught me that not all moths are ugly, which is what I always thought. There are actually some very beautiful moths, and I studied moths a little bit afterward to see what some of the beautiful ones look like.

6. Little House on the Prairie by [Wilder, Laura Ingalls]

When I read this book in elementary school, I enjoyed it so much I wanted to learn more about when the country was young and what it was like to travel in a wagon train. Over the years, I have studied this time period and traveling by covered wagon quite a bit.

7. Centralia (Jed Patrick series Book 1) by [Dellosso, Mike]

This is a more recent read, and our family had driven through Centralia once several years ago, and I found it fascinating. After reading this book, my curiosity was once again piqued, and so I’ve done a bit of research on Centralia.

8. Nick of Time (A Bug Man Novel) by [Downs, Tim]

This book has a character who has a bunch of dogs that she trained in a very unusual way that I found absolutely fascinating. Ever since I read it, I would love to learn how to train dogs the way that she did, but I haven’t been able to find anything on it.

9. 

When I read this book when I was younger, it made me want to learn more about why people years ago accused women of being witches. Many years later, when my husband and I were first married and we went to visit one of his sisters in Massachusetts, so I checked to see how far it would be to Salem, and we were able to do some touring there to learn more.

10. 

This book made me want to learn more about rabies and how it affects animals and how much of a danger it is to people.

This list actually turned out to be harder than I thought it would be because I haven’t kept a good reading list for most of the years I’ve been reading. Also, as I created this list, I realized that my desire to learn more about something in particular comes more from nature and my environment and/or news topics than from books I read.

How about you? Have you dug deeper into something because of books you’ve read?

Top Ten Tuesday

/ kellyfbarr / 2 Comments

It’s time again for my TTT list.  The Broke and the Bookish suggested a list of the Top Ten Books I Enjoyed that have Under 2,000 Ratings on Goodreads.  I was quite surprised when I went to my Goodreads account in search of this information, and I hope that some of you will help increase the number of Ratings for these on Goodreads.

  1.  Fire and Water:A Suspense-filled Story of Art, Passion, and Madness

I thought this book was fantastic!  I know that Betsy is a fairly new author, and she’s an indie, so read this book and rate it on Goodreads.  This book is an incredible love story.  It touched my heart deeply and left a lasting impression in my mind.  It is absolutely unforgettable and worth the read.  I was shocked to see that this book has less than 300 Goodreads ratings.

2. Pompeii: City on Fire

This is a good read as well.  It begins with gladiators, includes a love story and the loss of a city.  It currently has less than 700 Goodreads ratings.

3. Havah: The Story of Eve

This was one of the ones that really surprised me because Tosca Lee is a well-known successful author.  She has co-authored some works with Ted Dekker, and yet this book currently has less than 1,700 ratings on Goodreads.  I liked this story quite a bit.  It was interesting to take a well-researched, yet also imaginative, journey into the story of Adam and Eve of the Bible.  Since the Bible couldn’t possibly tell us everything about the lives of all of the fascinating people it teaches about and their time periods, it’s very interesting to think about what more of their lives may have been like, and Tosca Lee does this well within the structure of what their time and lives may well have been like due to her in depth research.

4. The Hunted: A Novel    and    Scream

These are two great books for those of you who like suspense filled with weird or otherwordly things.  If you’ve never read any of Mike Dellosso’s books, you don’t know what you’re missing.  If you like Dean Koontz’s works, you’ll like Mikes Dellosso’s stories as well. So, go ahead, read a Mike Dellosso novel and boost those Goodreads ratings.

5. The Ark,the Reed,and the Fire Cloud (The Amazing Tales of Max & Liz #1)

This is the first book in the “Amazing Tales of Max and Liz” series by Jenny L. Cote.  Technically, these books are written for kids, but if you are an animal lover, you will love these stories not matter your age.  They are a great series for parents to read aloud to their kids or to enjoy as a family.  I read this one on my own first, then I read it to my 11 year old son, who absolutely loved it.  We just started reading the second book in the series and have already fallen in love with one of the new animal characters Jenny introduces in it.  This book currently has less than 300 Goodreads ratings.

6.  Love Unexpected (Beacons of Hope, #1)

My favorite books have always been romance and love stories, and in recent years if they have history included, all the better.  This is a wonderful story about Emma Chambers and a rash decision she makes so that her brother may be free from worrying about her.  At first she believes she may face an unhappy future because of her decision, but things eventually change for the better.  This is the first book in the “Beacons of Hope” series by Jody Hedlund.  This book currently has less than 1, 400 Goodread ratings.

7.  Centralia

Yes, I am a big Mike Dellosso fan, and so I would love to see more people reading and rating his books.  This one has been touted as “his best yet”, but  there is a sequel to this that just came out — Kill Devil which is getting great reviews on Amazon.  These two books are full of suspense and have been compared to the Bourne series by Robert Ludlum. Centralia currently has less than 200 Goodreads ratings.

8. Bone Rattler (Duncan McCallum, #1),   Eye of the Raven (Duncan McCallum, #2)  and  Original Death (Duncan McCallum, #3)

This series by Eliot Pattison is a story about mysterious killings that take place in Colonial America.  I love history and have always been fascinated by the American Indians and disgusted with the European immigrants’ treatment of them, so I enjoyed these books.  Currently, Bone Rattler as less than 1,300 Goodrreads ratings, Eye of the Raven has less than 300, and Original Death has less than 200.

9.  A Heart's Disguise (A Journey of the Heart, #1), A Heart's Obsession (A Journey of the Heart, #2), A Heart's Danger (A Journey of the Heart, #3), A Heart's Betrayal (A Journey of the Heart #4) and A Heart's Promise (A Journey of the Heart #5)

Yes, this is an historical romance series.  It is set in the Old West.  The books are short, easy reads and are quite enjoyable, especially when you want a good read but don’t have a lot of time.  Also, Colleen Coble is a well-established author, who wrote this series sometime ago, and just recently re-released it.  A Heart’s Disguise has less than 270 Goodreads ratings, A Heart’s Obsession has less than 210, and the last three books of this series each have less than 200 Goodreads ratings.

10. Dauntless (Valiant Hearts, #1)

Dauntless is the first book in the Valiant Hearts series by Dina L. Sleiman, and it recently was in the finals for the Young Adult category in the Carol Awards.  It’s a great book that includes history, action and adventure and romance!  Yet it has less than 1,000 Goodreads ratings.  Also, the third book of this series, Courageous, releases tomorrow!

Of course, I have rated all of these on Goodreads and you can also find my book reviews on them here on my blog under the Book Reviews category.

 

Top Ten Tuesday

/ kellyfbarr / 3 Comments

Today I get to choose what my Top Ten Tuesday list will be, since The Broke and Bookish have declared it Freebie Week!  So, I have decided to do a topic that The Broke and Bookish did before I began participating in Top Ten Tuesday.  Today’s list is “My Top Ten Bookish Confessions.”

  1.  I learned to read using the Dick and Jane books.
  2. I’m one of those who read everything I could get my hands on as a kid including milk cartons and cereal boxes.
  3. I used to read and record myself for an organization that provided books on tape for people with sight problems.
  4. I love to read to children.
  5. I love to use different voices for different characters when reading aloud to children.
  6. I wish I would have made a list of ALL of the books I’ve read since I started reading. (I’m still not as faithful at this as I should be.)
  7. My reading tastes have changed over the years.
  8. I regret getting rid of books I never read.
  9. I cannot resist a book sale, bargain book rack, a box of books at a yard or garage sale, or a discount book store.
  10. In addition to reading, I LOVE to write.  I am working on my first novel.  It is an historical romantic fiction book.

What about you?  What Bookish confessions are you hiding?  Leave a comment below and tell me one of your Bookish confessions.

Top Ten Tuesday

/ kellyfbarr / 2 Comments

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday as suggested by The Broke and Bookish is to be Top Ten Favorite 2016 Releases So Far this Year.

Since I do not read only new releases, my list will not have a full ten books on it.

  1.  

I have not read all nine of the novellas in this book yet, but the three or four that I did read were wonderful.  They had well-developed characters and great story lines.  I enjoyed the ones that I read and look forward to reading the rest of them soon.

2. 

I LOVED this story!  You can read my book review on it here.

3. 

This was also a very enjoyable read.  You can read my book review on it here.

4.  

I did buy this book, but I have not read it yet.  However, I am looking forward to reading it and I expect a great story because Terri Blackstock has never failed to deliver.

I hope you have found something of interest in my very short list.  Happy reading!

Top Ten Tuesday

/ kellyfbarr / Leave a comment

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday as suggested by The Broke and Bookish is the “Top Ten Most Anticipated Releases for the Second Half of the Year”, or “Most Anticipated Genre”, “Debut Authors”.

I have to admit, yes, I LOVE books and I LOVE to read.  However, I do not follow anything that keeps me in the know of what’s due to come out and have no idea where to find this information.  I tried to Google it and was unsuccessful.

I only know when an author I follow and really like has something due to release, so I will tell you of two books that I have been anxiously awaiting:

  1.  Kill Devil

Kill Devil by Mike Dellosso released recently.  It is the second book in the series that Mike began with Centralia, which was a great edge-of-your seat thriller, and I have no doubt that Kill Devil will deliver heart pounding action and suspense as well.  I can’t wait to get my hands on this book, and I highly recommend that you get your copy soon as well, and if you haven’t read Centralia, get that one and read it too.

2.  

Courageous by Dina L. Sleiman is the third book in Dina’s “Valiant Hearts” series.  These books are filled with adventure and the main characters are strong women.  Dauntless was Book 1 and Chivalrous was Book 2 of this series.  They are great books that will keep you turning pages.  I look forward to the release of Courageous in July 2016!

 

What Have I Been Reading Lately?

/ kellyfbarr / 2 Comments

I suppose some of you may be missing my book reviews.  I know it’s been quite a while since I’ve done one because I have been reading books in the genre I am trying to write in hopes to help me with my scene setting.

Therefore, I have been reading a lot of Love Inspired Historical Fiction books and other Historical books about the old west.  Some of the titles I recently finished are:

The Love Inspireds:
Wagon Train Reunion by Linda Ford
The Runaway Bride by Moelle Marchand
Hill Country Cattleman by Laurie Kingery

Other Historical Fiction:
Heart of Gold by Robin Lee Hatcher

I enjoyed each of these stories and if you like romance stories of cowboys in the old west, you would enjoy them as well.

I’m not sure when I will get back to doing book reviews because my main focus is writing my novel, and now I have begun to read the Love Comes Softly and Prairie Legacy series by Janette Oke.  These are older books but are still great stories of the old west as well, and so I continue to read for help with my writing.

Do you like old west stories involving romance with cowboys?