I'm an author, but I'm also a reader. From time to time, I'll share my reviews of present and past reads. My available time to read is limited because I write, but I love to curl up with a paperback or an eBook at night for the last hour of my day.
I tend to read what I write, but not exclusively. Besides
Romantic Suspense and mystery, I read crime and law novels, once in a while a
true story, WWII historicals, romance, and mainstream character driven books.
Here are some of the books I've read recently or in the not-too-distant past.
Maybe you'll discover a new book or author.
My Review:
Maggie is a granny woman, a skilled midwife. But Maggie has spent her life learning and practicing healing beyond childbirth. Her knowledge of herbs is almost secondary to her gift of healing through faith and mental attitude. Her daughter Carrie Ann rejected Maggie’s style of healing, believing her ideas were crazy and more like magic. When Carrie Ann left to pursue a medical education, with Maggie’s blessing, she also left her daughter Josie Mae behind for Maggie to raise on her farm in Green Mountain Gap holler. Carrie Ann returned to practice medicine but in the near town of Burnsville. Josie Mae matures, caught between her mother’s and her grandmother’s worlds.
This is the point where the story begins for the reader. The time frame for Daughters of Green Mountain Gap is 1892-1894 with an epilogue set in 1926. The setting is North Carolina hill country and on the Cherokee nation. The dynamics between the three women is a remarkable story. The characterizations are deep and develop to the very end. The events are heart tugging and page turning.
Ms. Brown weaves her story of folklore and science using
knowledge of herbs and history. I didn’t question it, and it wasn’t
overwhelming. I’ve read books that seem more like the author trying to prove
her knowledge and spotlight her research. Ms. Brown’s style is flawless in this
respect.
Evocative and thought-provoking. Daughters of Green Mountain Gap exposes the inexplicable complexities of the relationships between the generations of the three women. I highly recommend this book.
Eliot “Scorp” Traversini is no stranger to pain. Quinn loves her new apartment building but not Scorp, her neighbor. As Scorp and Quinn bond over his sister, they spark a passion they never expected. But dark secrets and unrelenting fears threaten their newfound romance.
My Review:
If you’re a lover of romance novels, this book has several tropes to wet your appetite. Opposites attract qualifies for Scorp and Quinn. Elliot, known as Scorp, is a tattooed monster of a man, all handsome, yet looking like the bad boy. Quinn is the artistic type with a more timid personality. Quinn can’t help but run into the man who lives across the hall…forced proximity. She doesn’t like him, but something draws her to him. When she finds out he’s raising his kid sister, cracks in her resolve grow wide.
So what’s going on with these two that they can’t just charge in and get to know each other—secrets. They both have pasts, and those pasts aren’t pretty.
Quinn isn’t totally wrong evaluating her neighbor as a bad boy. He’s self-destructive in an effort to forget and deal with a past that has left deep scars. But his heart of gold and the gentle nature masked by his macho good looks can’t hide from her for long. He’s taken in his little sister to protect her from a similar fate.
The heroine and hero in this story have a lot of depth. What bothered me is having the full scope of their pasts purposely hidden until late in the book. Perhaps Ms. Joynt-Lang’s purpose was to build intrigue or conflict, but I think the characters would’ve been fuller and the story smoother if we’d known the why of their actions sooner.
Romance lovers will be immersed in the blossoming love
between Scorp and Quinn with their ups and downs, and in the middle of all the
conflict is a sweet little girl.
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