Thin Ice (Review)

Author: Irene Hannon

Genre: Suspense, Romance

My Rating: 8 out of 10

Revell 

After losing her parents and her sister, Christy Reed has been mired in grief. Now, life is finally starting to feel normal again - until an envelope addressed in her sisters handwriting arrives in the mail. And the note inside claims that she is still alive.

FBI Special Agent Lance McGregor, a former Delta Force operator, is assigned to reopen the case..but he's coming up with more questions than answers. Is Christy a pawn in a twisted cat-and-mouse game, or the target of a sinister plot? As Lance digs deeper, one thing becomes clear: Some one in the shadows has a deadly agenda

My thoughts

I am a HUGE geek, when it comes to suspense novels and I read each and every one that I can get my hands on. Irene Hannon is brilliant in writing suspense, I have read several of her books already and I have loved all of them. She masterfully incorporates all the components in a plot in to one huge thrilling spiral of suspense that makes her novels a heart-beating package of words.
This book was another wonderful read in the genre of suspense and I defiantly recommend it.

Christy Reed is a character that has gone trough some seriously hard stuff and it is a little hard to read her POV because it feels so tense, which is exactly what I liked about it. She is a great protagonist who is grieving and doesn't see very far beyond her grief, I feel. Irene incorporated a great story line about her iceskating career,  that I found interesting because I have never read about the life of an ice skater before.

Agent Lance is a very likable guy who has had his share of trauma and the romance between him and Christy is so cute and well woven into the story. He is the typical awesome agent that comes to the rescues falling in love along the way. I got a good smile at the bantering between him and his brother, very enjoyable and comfortable character.

As far as the negative go.........

The criminal in the story (and the crime line in general) creeped me out to no end, It was a bit nasty and the way that the criminal treated his grandmother DROVE ME NUTS. It was more the disturbed-in-the-head kind of criminal than the revenge criminal and those are always a bit less enjoyable to me. All that could have been passed by, but I also felt like he didn't have a very good reason for committing this crime and threatening Christy. I was expecting a big story line as to why he hated Christy, maybe a money issue or a competitive issue in the rink...but no.....it was this really lame reason which made the crime feel really stupid.  But other that that I really did enjoy this book and do recommend it for all you suspense fans out there.

My rating: 8 out of 10

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

Leah

Undaunted Hope (Review)

Author: Jody Hedlund

Genre: Historical Fiction, Romance

My Rating: 6.5 out of 10

Bethany House Publishers 

Running from the mistakes of her past, Tessa Taylor heads to the uppermost reaches of Michigan, planning to serve as the new teacher to the children of the miners. She quickly learns the town had requested a male teacher, but Percival Updegraff, superintendent and chief mine clerk, says she can stay thought the winter since its to late to replace her. Tessa cant help but thank him and say she in his debt.

Determined to make herself irreplaceable once spring thaw arrives, Tessa throws herself  into her work and soon two students have decided Miss Taylor is the right match for their grieving father. At the same time, charming assistant light-housekeeper Alex Bjorkland makes his interest known, surprising Tessa, who has never had men fight for her hand before, But  not all is well as she feels someone is tracking her every move. and she may not be able to escape the trap that has been laid for her.

My thoughts:

As this is the first book by Jody Hedlund that I have read I had very high expectations as to what her writing would be, as I have heard many good things from her. So with a the bar set rather ridiculously high I opened up the pages and prepared to jump on to the Jody Heldund train.

Sadly I must say that the train passed by and I will not be jumping on it at this time. I tried to enjoy the book as I went along and see where the author was going but I was rather disappointed. The plot would have been good but I feel like it was just occasionally peeking out behind the romance. And trust me there was a lot of romance. Tessa's love interest ,Alex, seemed to be shirtless half of the book and there was constant reference to his looks. It is okay to mention it in the first chapter to establish the chapter of Alex and what Tessa thinks of him, but after awhile it got really repetitive and annoying. Tessa was a interesting character but nothing I haven't seen before. I also felt like the book was far to long, and could have been shortened a hundred pages.

On the bright side this book was easy to read and I found myself at the end before I knew it. And while I didn't quit enjoy it as much as I would have liked, I will be reading another of Jody Hedlunds Books soon.

Overall this was just not the outstanding unique book I was hoping for and I felt like I was reading a book that any other author could have written. But to those who are wising for a quick romance this is the book for you.

My rating: 6/5 out of 10

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

Leah

The Heathy Mind Cookbook (Review)

 Author: Rebecca Katz with Mat Edelson 

Genre: Cookbook

My Rating: 9.8 out of 10

Blogging for Books

So here I am, living my good old life, chillin-out reading a book, when my brother slams the front door while yelling "YOU GOT A BOOK".  So yes my life went from great to EXCELLENT!!! 

This cook book is seriously beautiful, it has a beautiful cover, lovely hardback and I just had to dive right in. Now lest you think that this is just your regular cookbook let me inform you that is is NOT!!

The first page you open up to is a beautiful picture of a salad that makes you feel like cooking right away, and then the next 40 pages are filled top to bottom with information about eating healthy, and get this, it lists all of the ingredients that you will run into in the recipes following, telling you all the benefits that they have. 

example. Shrimp. Cognitive functioning. Focus. Learning. Memory. Neuronal health

and then it will follow with a short paragraph. 

I was enamored by this section on the cookbook and I hadn't even read any of the recipes!!!!

And don't even get me started on the recipes, they are so straight forward and divided into sections such as soups, salads. etc. They are unique and most of these recipes I have never heard of.  The Organic/Healthy aspect of this is crazy excellent and accurate. 

As far as negative go the ONLY thing that I could pick out was the fact that only about every third recipe had a picture to go with it, and as I am a very visual learner that tended to bother me as I thought "How do I know what I am cooking is supposed to look like" but the pictures that there were were ABSOLUTELY STUNNING!!!!!

Over all I felt like these authors did an excellent job and every time I turned the page I could feel the fact that they worked hard and really care about what went into it. 

I recommend this book to anyone and everyone, but especially to those who want to start eating healthy this new year. 

I received this book for free from Blogging for Books in exchange for my honest review.

xoxo

Leah