by Teri M. Brown Teri M. Brown has written a timely novel that started with a conversation between her and a family friend. That friend was Ukrainian and the rest is history, so to speak. As the story opens, you meet Ivanna and her husband, Lyaksandro. Turmoil is pulling their lives apart. Ukraine was a dangerous place to be in the 1970’s. It was under Soviet rule, but the rumblings of independence were growing. All Ivanna knows is that her husband is dead and now she and their young daughter, Yevtsye, are alone. Ivanna works hard to provide for the two of them. Yevtsye excels in school and is…
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There are some books you are just meant to read at a certain time in your life. The pandemic has left me waiting, I realized today. Waiting to do so many things and this book helped me see that I shouldn’t wait any longer. Not that my head and heart had not been telling me the same thing for quite a while. Sometimes you need beautiful words written by someone else to figure it out. “Faye, Faraway” is more than a time travel book. I was skeptical at first about the whole idea of her falling through a cardboard box and falling back in time to meet herself as a…
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This book opens the story in Bryson City, North Carolina. A town that’s always had it’s challenges. The train comes through on a regular schedule each day and shakes the trailer where we meet Barbara at a turning point in her life. She’s ready to escape her hometown and it’s lack of opportunity for her. One fateful night, in 1960 her life is changed forever. As the story weaves back-and-forth between 1960 and 1976 we meet her daughter, Carole Ann, and her mother, Pearlene. They are three women struggling just to survive. As their choices intersect, all the secrets that Barbara has been swallowing alone, come to the surface. The…
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This intense thriller focuses on motherhood, being a mother, being a good mother. As we get to know several generations of mothers, we see what damage one bad soul can do to their children. We read through examples of good mothers who take care other people’s children and bad mothers who can’t mother at all. And then there is a child, Violet. Blythe Connor gives birth to her first child, a daughter she and Fox, her husband, name Violet. As the exhausting days of motherhood overwhelm Blythe, she begins to think there’s something wrong. Something terribly wrong with her child. She prefers the touch of her father almost from the…
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Wow! 5 Stars! After I won an ARC on Instagram, I couldn’t wait to start this amazing book that published on March 3rd, 2021. The Lost Apothecary had me from the first chapter. As we follow Nella in the 1700’s and Caroline in present day, both ladies are struggling. Caroline finds a small blue vial on her first day in London on a “mud larking” outing. She’s alone on the trip after she found out her husband cheated on her. We follow along as her love of history pushes her to search for the bottle’s origin. All while she sorts out what she want her future to look like. Meanwhile,…
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Ruth, it’s a perfect name from the Bible for this real woman. A name given to her by her grandmother when she was born. A name her Mama (grandmother) hoped would allow her granddaughter to get her foot in a lot of doors. As we get to know our Ruth, we find out that she has a secret. A big secret. This smart, funny woman has a secret that she’s held onto almost her whole life. She hasn’t told her any of her friends, and definitely not her husband. This secret is pressing down on her hard and she’s not sure what to do. You see our Ruth had a…
