Book Review: The Redcoats Are Coming! by Marianne Hering and Nancy I. Sanders

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Back Cover: 
Join Cousins Patrick and Beth on a patriotic adventure set in 1775, Concord, Massachusetts. They have a simple mission: to deliver a letter to Paul Revere. They arrive just in time to meet founding fathers John Hancock and Samuel Adams. They also meet a teen girl named Sybil. She's collecting musket balls for the Patriots and is on the lookout for Loyalist spies. But where is Paul Revere? When the letter goes mysteriously missing, all seems lost. Patrick and Beth try to get it back, only to be accused as spies! Will they be able to convince Paul Revere they're on the side of freedom? Or will the real spies win out and crush the Revolution before it begins?

The Positives:
Well, firstly I have loved Adventures in Odyssey since I was 4. I've probably listened to almost every single episode. (There are over 700!) I saw this book for review on Tyndale and I thought, "Why not? May not be the most interesting book for my age, but I still love Adventures in Odyssey!"
I read it in about 45 minutes. Super easy and it was a bit interesting, if not also predictable. I'm sure it's exciting for the age group this is intended for: (7 year olds and up). It was definitely a fun trip back to the Revolutionary War. Paul Revere is always a great person for kids to learn about.
This book did leave cliffhanger, with Patrick and Beth jumping into the Imagination Station which had just been hit by an imaginary bullet. It ended with them being on a ship in the middle of the ocean with a pistol being pointed at their backs.

The Negatives: 
I didn't find anything wrong with this book!

The Overall:
This was a very enjoyable read, even if it wasn't for my age group. I highly recommend to any moms that want their kids reading good, Christian books!

I received this book for free from Tyndale House in exchange for my honest review.

Who Exactly is My Character?

We all go through the time when we don't know who exactly our characters are. Are they quiet? Funny? Considerate? Reserved? Loud? It's important to know as much as you can about your character. 

Lately, I have been taking personality tests for most of my characters. I use the Human Metrics Jung Typology test. The questions make you really think about who exactly your character is. Sometimes the result I got for my character doesn't seem quite right. And other times it fits them perfectly. 

I highly recommend doing the test for your characters. I feel like I get an inside look into their heads and walk in their shoes. 

My friend, Bridget, and I are writing a book together and we spent probably half an hour taking the personality quizzes for the characters separately. (Because we live about 2,000 miles apart!) We got different results for each of the characters and we found descriptions that applied to the character in question and decided which personality fit them the best. We still have one character that we still aren't quite sure about, but we will probably figure out more about her personality the more we write her! 

I hope this post was helpful to all writers out there! And if anyone is interested in Bridget and I's book, here is the Pinterest inspiration board for it: Storyboard: Found

Book Review: Burning Sky by Lori Benton

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Back cover:
Abducted by Mohawk Indians at fourteen and renamed Burning Sky, Willa Obenchain is driven to return to her family’s New York frontier homestead after many years building a life with the People. At the boundary of her father’s property, Willa discovers a wounded Scotsman lying in her path. Feeling obliged to nurse his injuries, the two quickly find much has changed during her twelve-year absence—her childhood home is in disrepair, her missing parents are rumored to be Tories, and the young Richard Waring she once admired is now grown into a man twisted by the horrors of war and claiming ownership of the Obenchain land.
When her Mohawk brother arrives and questions her place in the white world, the cultural divide blurs Willa’s vision. Can she follow Tames-His-Horse back to the People now that she is no longer Burning Sky? And what about Neil MacGregor, the kind and loyal botanist who does not fit into in her plan for a solitary life, yet is now helping her revive her farm? In the aftermath of the Revolutionary War, strong feelings against “savages” abound in the nearby village of Shiloh, leaving Willa’s safety unsure.
Willa is a woman caught between two worlds. As tensions rise, challenging her shielded heart, the woman called Burning Sky must find a new courage--the courage to again risk embracing the blessings the Almighty wants to bestow. Is she brave enough to love again?

The Positives:
I loved this book!! I thought it was amazing for the author's first novel. The historical elements were very well done. I did not see a single historical element out of place. 
I loved Willa and Neil's romance. I thought it was extremely well done. I loved how Neil took down the wall around Willa's heart, brick by brick. He showed his character and his love through his actions. 
I never thought this book was long in parts. I love long books. If I had had more time, I would have read this book all the way through in one day. 
The ending was very well done. I felt the author didn't leave any threads loose. She tied it up extremely well. I usually like epilogues or sequels to books. But I felt this book didn't need it. I was completely satisfied with the ending. (Which is a bit of a rare thing for me.) 

The Negatives: 
This book had hardly any negatives for me. Maybe just the beginning, because I wasn't sure what to expect. The author slightly threw me head first into the story, where Will first finds Neil. Now that I have read the whole book, the beginning didn't take anything away from the book at all. 

Overall:
This has probably been one of the best books I have read this year. I highly recommend it!

I received this book for free from Blogging for Books for this review.

Author Website 

Giveaway!

Hi everyone!

I'm hoping to get more followers and traffic for my blog, so I'm going to be doing a giveaway!

I have an Etsy shop called MercifullyMade. I will be giving away a set of washi tape covered notebooks and pencils that I made. 

Here's what you could win! To enter, simply do the things instructed to do on the form below and you are entered!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Unafraid ABCs Put On Hold

Hey everyone! So you know I promised back in July that every week I would write about something or somebody that started with a certain letter in the alphabet that went with the book I'm writing. And as you all know, I haven't kept that promise. Sorry. :-(
I am currently planning out Unafraid more thoroughly in One Year Adventure Novel. I have been thinking through much of my plot. And I'm going to have to do a major re-writing on it. I
So I'm not going to be able to do the Unafraid alphabet posts like I had been planning.

I hope you're not all too disappointed! I'm also planning on doing NaNoWriMo this year. I'm going to be busy doing that all this November. I won't have much time to post. But I hope to do a post after it's over and tell you all how it went!

Auf Wiedersehen!

-Mercy

Book Review: Twilight's Serenade by Tracie Peterson

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars, for confusing elements

Back cover:

Britta Lindquist left Sitka six years ago in an attempt to distance herself from the love of her life, Yuri Belikov. Upon her return, she finds Yuri absent and his wife about to deliver a child. When tragic circumstances ensue, Britta suddenly finds herself caring for Yuri's children--and her life intertwining with the man she's tried so hard to forget. 
But Britta's other great love is for the violin, and her talent is recognized by Brenton Maltese, a conductor from England. He proposes she accept the coveted first chair position in his orchestra and also his hand in marriage. At a crossroads, Britta must determine what her heart truly longs for--and if she's willing to fight for it.

The positives:
I loved all of Britta's family and her also. I loved that it was set in Alaska and was able to visualize it very well. I thought her relationship with Yuri was very well written and very believable.

The negatives:
Probably because I haven't read the first two books of the series, everything in this book seemed a bit disjointed. From the back cover, I thought this book would have more to do with her violin and Brenton Maltese. During the whole course of the book, Britta didn't play her violin even once. And Brenton Maltese only had a very small part in the book. The book constantly switched point of views. And Lydia's family relationships confused me. Is Aunt Evie Dalton's sister? Or Lydia's sister? I couldn't figure that one out. Also it seemed confusing that Marston was much older than Dalton, even though they were brothers. That would have made Lydia's first husband much older than she was. Very confusing.

Overall:
All in all, this book was a very enjoyable read, even with some technical problems.

Buy it Here

A is for Adwar

Sorry it took so long to post this! I've been really busy and haven't had time to work on this.

What is a better place to start then with the country the story takes place in? Adwar.

(Sorry about the quality of the map. I'm not the neatest writer. The book will have a professional one. I just wanted to post this one, to show you what Adwar looks like.)
Adwar is an island surrounded by oceans. It has a land mass the size of Colorado, about 104,000 sq. miles. (And if you are good at your geography, you will notice that Adwar is shaped a lot like France. Yes, I did use France as an outline.) The population is around 2 or 3 million.
Adwar is separated into three countries; Lolnal, Ulairo, and Irior. Lolnal is the land west of the Enol river and includes the Angad mountains and the Angad desert. Ulairo is the land east of the Enol river and south of the Inder mountains. Irior is the land north of the Inder mountains. It is cut off from Lolnal and Ulairo by the Inder mountains.
Adwar has four large bays; Bay of Ulairo, Bay of Lolnal, Bay of Irior, and Bay of Abaddon.
There are three sets of mountain ranges; Angad mountains, Inder mountains, and the Dark Mountains.
Rivers are in abundance. There are several large rivers; Usteld, Enol, Ackser, Ineart, and Eardo. These rivers breaks off into many different rivers and those break off into streams and creeks.
Much of Adwar is wooded. Trees grow thick and fast near the rivers.
There are many meadows and plains. The largest in the Plain of Ulairo, where many armies meet for battle because of it's central location.
There is only one desert, called the Angad desert. Not many people live there because of how dry it is. Not much is known about the people that do live there, because it is mostly cut off from the rest of Adwar.

I hope you enjoyed the first post in the Unafraid alphabet post series! I will cover specific details about each country in Adwar in later posts. Thanks for reading!

First blog, first post, and the Unafraid alphabet!

Yay!! This is my first blog and my very first post! After a Teens Write seminar, I finally convinced my mom that it is important to have a blog to get “a following”.  I told her that the public likes sneak peeks and then, they get excited about what is coming out next! She is kinda old-fashioned and thinks it is putting ‘the cart before the horse’ but she is a loving “mommy’ so . . . I finally have a blog! I plan on posting a lot about my writing projects and probably some book reviews, too.

Look for a series of blog posts about my current project, Unafraid. Molly Evangeline (her books are awesome) did a series of posts on her blog about her Makilien Trilogy using the alphabet. Based on her idea, I want to use one letter of the alphabet each week and introduce you to my story. Since there are 26 letters in the alphabet, this will give me 26 weeks to finish writing and revising Unafraid. Stay tuned!