The Ox-Boy of Ur by Rose Shaw is a brilliantly researched and developed book for young adults. Set in the year of 2000 BCE, we find a thirteen-year-old boy who has just been sold to a slave trader to pay his father's debts. The young...

The Story of Hunadi by Mokoka Klaas Mashishi is a wonderful depiction of a few African families living on a farm during apartheid in South Africa. We are introduced to twins Sello and Hunadi, and Gerrit, the son of the white farmer, Kruis. Gerrit is...

Deplorable living and working conditions, low pay and diseases are just a few things the lower classes endure in Manchester, England. These attributed to Thomas Berry’s death and his grieving widow, Sarah, finds herself struggling to survive with five children. She’s a talented dressmaker who...

In The Gomorrah Principle by Rick DeStefanis, Brady is a man on a mission, a mission to discover what happened to his best friend, the brother of the woman he loves. In order to accomplish his mission he’ll have to go to the last place...

In The Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller, the scene is set in rural Iowa. Robert has been assigned to photograph the beautiful old wooden bridges, a vanishing piece of architecture. A chance need of directions, and Francesca being home alone, with her...

The Ambitious Madame Bonaparte by Ruth Hull Chatlien tells the true story of Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte, better known as Betsy. She was the daughter of a Baltimore merchant, William Patterson, and was the first wife of Jérôme Bonaparte and sister-in-law of Emperor Napoleon I of...

The Roof Walkers by Keith Henderson takes us to Christmas, 1864, where we meet Irish Canadian Eoin O'Donoghue who has been hired as the personal secretary to the possible head of the Irish Republican Army in New York. When he offers his services to the...

I was quite impressed with Steven Weaver’s The Vault: A Journey of Discovery as I found it an unexpectedly well-written story with distinctive characters, realistic dialogue and a fairly solid plot. While the book is targeted to a younger audience and contains a lot of...

The Bridge Club by H.M. Edwards is a fascinating look into generations of America, and a crime that can haunt families through decades. The Bridge Club meets on Saturdays. They share their lives over the cards, but one of the things they share is a...

The Way Back: A Soldier’s Journey by S.K. Carnes tells the story of John Chapman, a World War I veteran with PTSD and a poet’s soul. He finds work as a farmhand with a dairy farming family who, in their own stalwart, beholden-to-no-one way, help...