Acquired Book By: I recently started hosting with Prism Book Tours, having noticed the badge on Tressa’s blog (Wishful Endings) whilst I was visiting her blog as we would partake in the same blog tours and/or book blogosphere memes. I had to put the memes on hold these past several months (something I hope to resume in 2018) but as I enquired about hosting for Prism, I found I liked the niche of authors and stories they were featuring regularly. I am unsure how many books I’ll review for them as most are offered digitally rather than in print but this happily marks one of the blog tours where I could receive a print book for review purposes. Oft-times you’ll find Prism Book Tours alighting on my blog through the series of guest features and spotlights with notes I’ll be hosting on behalf of their authors.
I received a complimentary copy of “Rescued by the Firefighter” direct from the author Catherine Lanigan in exchange for an honest review. I did not receive compensation for my opinions or thoughts shared herein.
Why I wanted to read this story & continue with the series itself:
As I had previously declared having read the ninth book in the Shores of Indian Lake series, I wanted to continue reading more stories by the pen of Ms Lanigan! I had intended to back-read the series through my local library by requesting them through ILL’ing services (inter-library loan) – however, this particular year I’ve been a bit higher on my queue levels and due to the changes to our ILL services catalogue taking longer to ‘clear’ our requests after they’ve been returnt, I haven’t quite sorted out a system yet where I can balance what I want to request with what I’ve already received! I’m hoping as I move closer into the New Year, I’ll master a new plan of action and can start to re-visit this lovely series from the beginning! I have quite a few Harlequin Heartwarming series which fall in this category of #booklove and I dearly look forward to spending more time inside them as time moves forward!
However, when I heard about the premise of this tenth novel was centred round a firefighter, I was overjoyed as I love reading about first responders and emergency personnel! I even have a favourite Hallmark Channel movie starring Alison Sweeney which involves a firefighter who swoons her heart into realising she deserved a ‘second chance’ at both love and romance! Not to mention the fact, I loved how the husband of Jennifer Love Hewitt’s character in ‘Ghost Whisperer’ was a firefighter!
Before I begin sharing my thoughts on this 10th installment,
let’s look back and re-visit what drew me into the style
and heart of Ms Lanigan’s writings:
One of my favourite parts of the whole story though was seeing Mica’s family – from his brothers to his sister-in-laws to his Mum and her beau, all stepping forward to help Grace in her time of need. Even her renewed friendships with those she left behind in the towne were heart-warming to see blossoming back into her life. As one of her friends said quite well: it’s one thing to go it alone but without someone to lean on or others to sound off on whilst your trying to juggle everything in life, things get difficult fast! Isn’t that the truth!
Seeing Grace surrounded by support and friendship reminded me why I loved “Three Men and A Baby” as much as I did growing up! I was still a kid myself when the film first came out – it made me laugh and smile and felt warm & cosy all over because of how Mary as a baby had impacted the lives of the Bachelor’s! I should have known then I’d love reading Romances & Women’s Fiction! The same is to be said of Mica – he hasn’t quite realised his own worth or his own capacity for being a father – this is something that is jarring him to his core and he has no idea how to handle the swirl of emotions assaulting him all at once. Whereas Grace reminds me so very much of Silvia (played by Nancy Travis) – unwilling to to compromise the well-being of her baby but without knowing how to ensure he’s being looked after properly.
This novel touched on all the moments I loved in the film, but it tells it’s own story, too. There is a long road towards redemption and the grace of second chances – where each party has to come to terms with their own baggage before they can move forward. At the centre of it all is this beautiful baby boy who gives their parents a run for their money! And, rightly so! He is just the unexpected ‘bundle’ to bridge a family back together whilst finding a way to heal two hearts who never realised how fractured they had become when they stopped letting themselves feel love and embracing the blessings which comes from being loved.
I look forward to back-reading the rest of the series and seeing which characters thread through the series overall – there are generally minor and major characters who take different roles in the spotlight in series similar to this one which will make it a lovely discovery as I move through each installment! I liked how Ms Lanigan tempered the emotional reactions with the living realities of parenthood – of the struggles of relationships which are never fully realised before pregnancies and how the choices after becoming a parent can make or break the relationship in the end. She dealt with a lot of hard topics – from depression to debilitating injury to unplanned and unwed pregnancy to commitment issues in relationships. The muddiness of her characters’ lives makes the resolutions a bit sweeter but also, it shows how hard the journey is to reach a point of peace within the spirit of the person living the life with the hand they are dealt.
-quoted from my review of His Baby Dilemma
Rescued by the Firefighter
Subtitle: Shores of Indian Lake
by Catherine Lanigan
Source: Author via Prism Book Tours
He saved her life…
But will he destroy her dreams?
Firefighter Rand Nelson is tall and handsome and has literally walked through an inferno for Beatrice Wilcox. He’s a hero…and that’s exactly the problem. Beatrice knows all too well the risks of loving a man with a dangerous career. But when Rand’s report threatens her beloved children’s camp, Beatrice can’t refuse his offer of help…even though she knows they’re both playing with fire.
Places to find the book:
ISBN: 9781335633880
Also by this author: His Baby Dilemma, Hers to Protect, Home for Christmas
Also in this series: His Baby Dilemma, Hers to Protect, Home for Christmas
Published by Harlequin Heartwarming
on 6th November, 2018
Format: Mass Market Paperback
Pages: 384
The Shores of Indian Lake series:
Published by: Harlequin Heartwarming (@HarlequinBooks) | imprint of Harlequin Books
Formats Available: Paperback* and Ebook
*Harlequin has the luxury of offering Regular, Large & Larger Print editions
which I personally can attest are lovely to be reading! Especially after a migraine or when my eyes are fatigued.
Converse via: #ShoresOfIndianLake and #Harlequin + Heartwarming
About Catherine Lanigan
Catherine Lanigan is the international bestselling and award-winning author of forty published titles in both fiction and non-fiction, including the novelizations of Romancing the Stone and The Jewel of the Nile, as well as over half a dozen anthologies, including “Chicken Soup for the Soul: Living your Dream”, “Chicken Soup for the Writer’s Soul”, and more.
Ms. Lanigan’s novels have been translated into dozens of languages including German, French, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Portuguese, Chinese, and Japanese. Ms. Lanigan’s novels are also available in E-books on Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble.com, Apple Store, Mobi and Kobo. Several of her titles have been chosen for The Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Clubs. Her Vietnam war-based novel, The Christmas Star, won the Gold Medal Award Top Pick from Romantic Times Magazine and has also won Book of the Year Romance Gold Award from ForeWord Magazine as well as Book of the Year Romance from Reader’s Preference.
Lanigan is the author of a trilogy of non- fiction books regarding angelic intervention in human life: Angel Watch, Divine Nudges and Angel Tales published by HCI and Cedar Fort. Skyhorse published Lanigan’s “how-to” book on writing: Writing the Great American Romance Novel. Lanigan was tasked by the NotMYkid Foundation to write a non-fiction book addressing teen addictions. Ms. Lanigan’s first Young Adult adventure novel, The Adventures of Lillie and Zane: The Golden Flute, was published by Cedar Fort.
Currently, she has published eight novels in the Shores of Indian Lake series for Harlequin Heartwarming: Love Shadows, Heart’s Desire, A Fine Year for Love, Katia’s Promise, Fear of Falling, Sophie’s Path and Protecting the Single Mom. Family of His Own pubs July, 2016. She has recently contracted for one more in the series: His Baby Dilemma.
As a cancer survivor, Ms. Lanigan is a frequent speaker at literary functions and book conventions as well as inspiring audiences with her real stories of angelic intervention from her Angel Tales series of books.
She is an outspoken advocate for domestic violence and abuse and was honored by The National Domestic Violence Hotline in Washington, D.C. (THE EVOLVING WOMAN). She has been a guest on numerous radio programs including “Coast to Coast” and on television interview and talk show programs as well as blogs, podcasts and online radio interview programs.
Author Notes to Readers:
I missed seeing the screen adaptation of Heart Desire on Hallmark Channel earlier in the year, however, I recently had a trial of #SlingTV – which I spent watching Hallmark Channel and their secondary channel: Movies and Mysteries! I loved how they had folders for ‘on-demand’ movies and specials whilst SlingTV itself made it quite easy to keep up to the minute with the series or shows I wanted to be watching on the networks themselves. Being that Hallmark was the biggest pull for me and my family, we opted to switch-over to Hallmark Movies Now – the special option for budget seeking tv viewers who’ve become #cablecutters!
Not only does this new feature have all the Hallmark loveliness I love about the channel, they feature a rotation of movies, tv series and specials! So, whilst I’m currently watching Thanksgiving, Harvest and Christmas movies – I’m also getting a chance to watch Crime Dramas as well as series like Sue Thomas: F.B. Eye, Heartland and others! I’m going to see if I spy The Sweetest Heart pop up under ‘Romance’ and if so, I’ll look forward to sharing my thoughts on it whenever it arrives! I’m thankful she mentioned the title again as I might have missed out on seeing it!
When I saw Ms Lanigan mention she was writing ‘half dozen’ more stories set on the Shores of Indian Lake, my heart rejoiced! I’ve come to love this series and hopefully I will be able to sort out how to fetch the first eight stories before the 11th or 12th makes their debut as I know series like these are always graduated out ahead of readers – so, at some point, in the nearer future I hope to start making headway on my desire to read the whole series!
my review of rescued by the firefighter:
Fire waits for no man. Neither does Ms Lanigan waste time settling us into the scene where a fire is slowly arching its way towards Beatrice and her youth camp. You feel as if you’ve travelled straight into the fire itself – seeing what Beatrice and her staff are seeing, dampening down your fears, swallowing your anxiety and acting on instinct to protect the children. In other words, Lanigan knits you so close to the reality of how fast a fire can erupt out of nowhere, you do not have time to pause to think about the implications because you feel as if she’s placed you squarely into Beatrice’s shoes and are living this nightmare in real-time.
The quickening pace to outwit a fire is quite real – you don’t have to rely on television series or films to know how dangerous a fire can become. Anyone who lives near a forest (which is let’s face it nearly most of us!) to any degree of acres knows how dire it is for rangers and keepers of the forest to maintain the vegetation and undergrowth during the dry seasons where moisture is absent and lightning is a devil’s wand of chaos which ignites within seconds of a strike. Though in truth, even controlled burns give my heart and chest a flutter of anxiety – if the wind were to shift or the burn itself were to outgrow its perimeter, whose to say what would become of the fire line?
Your heart goes out to Beatrice – she made a singular act of courage take on the higher proportions of risk associated with a fire when she made a desperate sprint into the forest where trees were exploding, pine cones were melting and two young boys were lost in the smoke and mayhem of the fire! I was drinking in the words at such a fast clip by that point, I had to slow down just to understand what was going to happen next! You really feel like your heart is in the fire, wondering how Beatrice and the boys can emerge alive and also, what the after effects of surviving the fire will have on her and them long term. Mostly though – your nerves are frayed and your emotionally connected to the story in such a way, you don’t dare pause longer than it takes to catch your breath!
By the time the fire is smoldering itself out of its fury, your still catching up to the fact Rand found Chris and Beatrice was in the ER nursing a badly broken foot! What you did notice though is Rand was able to get through to Chris in a way the camp counselors hadn’t and with that revelation, he knew Chris had a secret. The kind of secret I’d suspect no fireman wanted to keep for long and then, of course leads into a lovely foreshadow of what is yet to come – I liked how the layers were set early-on, how Lanigan gives you a glimpse of where she wants this story to go direction wise but holds back some of the key bits as well. She wants you to wait it out and see how it unfolds – taking it gently and allowing you to understand her characters without prejudgement.
I applauded her choices in which children were sent to the youth camp – from those who were dealing with medical issues to those who were facing foster care placement or adoption options for the first time. These were children and youth whose lives were being interrupted in one way or another, whilst at the camp they could re-address certain aspects of their lives they were still in control of and maintain a bit of normalcy in the process. It sounded like the kind of camp you could go and heal whilst finding your voice or the path towards where your future could take you.
I felt for Rand, I really did! He was caught between that rock and a hard place no one wants to be – his feelings were unexpectedly distracting him but what hurt his heart more was the truth he was sorting out about the fire. From Beatrice, you automatically sided with her anguish in realising there were some moments in life you could not shield nor guard others from – accepting your limitations when you were in a role like her as temporary guardian and trusted advisor had to be difficult! Yet, as the story pans out – you start to see the undercurrent issues too – how sometimes it is better not to gloss over a difficult situation due to your own feelings about the person involved because those incidents could become magnified if gone unchecked. At least, this is what was going through my mind as I started to see both perspectives on the fire – Rand’s official stance and Beatrice’s compassion for her charges.
I truly loved how Langian was giving us choices – to consider both sides of this developing relationship whilst we countered it against our own thoughts on the topics being broached. How would you handle a high risk job factor in your potential partner? What would hold you back from seeking a relationship even if you knew your trust was well placed but your heart couldn’t skip over their profession? The harder layers of the novel are dealing with risk and assessment – how it is not just the person who is risking their lives on a job which inherently is risky but it is how we each individually deal with the risks we take in our own lives. Quirkily enough the author addresses this particular subject in her Guest Post and now I can see how it was first inspired. It parlays back into her story and gives illuminating insight into both Beatrice and Rand.
One of the secondary characters I absolutely adored was Amanda – the camp cook! She had a wonderful outlook on life – especially as she brought up an mantra in my own family about how ‘thoughts are things’ and you ought to be aware of how your thoughts can entreat on your mood as much as affect the reality you are living due to how powerful thoughts can become as they evoke a certain outlook on the world. Her warmth of presence in the kitchen and her dedication to Beatrice and the children is what warmed me to her – she had a way of sorting out what people needed most, how to give them a hug of love through their food and to give advice that perhaps wasn’t always the easiest to hear but was warranted to being said all the same!
No one knows the truth of their heart until their tested and throughout Rescued by the Firefighter we’re seeing two people testing the limits of their hearts whilst embracing the spontaneity of the moments they’ve been given together. It isn’t an easy road – there is a lot of give and take in relationships of this nature but what I love most is the honesty written into it. How Lanigan takes you closer to the key issues affecting Rand and Beatrice whilst pulling back the scope to involve the children directly as they take their own walk of faith in the narrative.
Each of these characters have something to learn – something they need to accept and somehow find the courage to find the growth they need to move forward. For each of them, it is a unique chance to set to right their past but also to put their anxieties and fears to bed as well. That is the hardest part about trusting others and of letting yourself ‘fall’ in love with the first place as Beatrice and Rand know so very well. You have to ‘let go’ of what you know is holding you back – even if the dive into the unknown doesn’t feel right at first, if you never dive you will never know what your capable of achieving.
I truly hope there are more stories coming soon in this series – the two installments I’ve read have solidified my joy of reading about the Shores of Indian Lake, as their rooted in real world problems, where honestly authentic lives are being lived and where hearts are attempting to both heal and move towards each other with the acceptance that comes out of forgiveness. Sometimes the best forgiveness is the kind we give back to ourselves as it grants us a freedom to live in a way that might not have been possible previously. This is why I have an attachment to the Heartwarming line of stories inasmuch as the Love Inspired – both are seeking the stories which talk about our human condition and the fuller scope of how romance arrives rather unexpectedly through a door we never realised we’d left open for it to blossom.
On the Contemporary Heart-centred story styling of Catherine Lanigan:
I love finding out the ‘behind-the-book’ bits authors leave for us in their Acknowledgements and Dedications. The ones included in this novel were a bit bittersweet, as Ms Lanigan was letting go of people she cared about and moving forward with a new team who was embracing her creative endeavours. Life is full of Seasons and sometimes the hardest ones are the new adventures awaiting us after a chapter closes in our lives. Here is to continued inspirations and museful thoughts for her as she happily continues to find the stories her heart loves to embrace, create and share with us all.
There was a moment where Ms Lanigan mentioned the reason why she enjoys writing Harlequin Heartwarming is due to the uplift in knowing she can write HEAs and endings which not only satisfy the journeys we’re taking with the characters but we can feel as if we’ve read a novel which was a delight start to finish to become absorbed inside. I couldn’t agree more! Her writings and Ms (Karen) Rock’s stand out in mind, but so too, do the women who are writing the Return of the Blackwell Brothers series – there are a few others as well, who are my personal favourites under this imprint who not only understand Lanigan’s sentimental reasons for writing the stories but the heart of why readers like myself appreciate them as well.
As soon as you dig into Rescued by the Firefighter you almost think your reading a #LoveINSPIRED Suspense novel due to the wicked pacing, the high octane suspense (fire is never static nor predictable!) and the cleverness of how we’re inserted into the horrors of a raging wildfire! I literally felt at one point I would wheeze on the smoke!
I warmed to Rand quite quickly – he was frustrated by finding a child who hadn’t wanted his help nor his attention but there was something else in that moment of reckoning he spent with Chris. A murmur of a memory – a reflection of something he wasn’t quite explaining outright and it gave me the idea that Rand himself had either a past he didn’t want to talk about openly or he knew someone who had a past similar to Chris. It is interesting how those threads knit together – how two people are meant to meet and why their meant to be in each others lives; if only for a brief period of time.
I have a special *extra!* treat for you dear hearts – I asked a question pertaining to “Rescued by the Firefighter” ahead of reading the story. I personally loved Ms Lanigan’s response and I hope you will as well. There is a lot of heart & thoughtfulness in her reply, which also speaks to a philosophical approach to how we perceive the world &/or our experiences. It was a delight to have this ‘extra’ element to showcase on my tour stop and I hope the response she gave will also happily resonate with you as much as it did with me!
Proposed Topic for Ms Lanigan: Part of “Rescued by The Firefighter” deals with the contemplation of entering into a romantic relationship with someone in a high risk field. How did you prepare for this side angle of the story and did you interview fire crews to gain their perspective of the difficulties of navigating around high intensity risks of their profession or did you write more strictly from imagination? I was curious what inspired the heart of the story and how you dealt with the realistic bits therein.”
Although it’s romantic and fun to conjure visions of me interviewing a crew of firefighters about their emotions and dealings in relationships, that was not quite the case. I did talk to both husbands and wives who deal with the stress of one or both being employed in high risk fields but to be honest, their attitude was “everything in life is high risk”.
Actually, that take on the situation gave me the insight to create the scene between Beatrice and Rand’s mother when she reveals/tells the story of how Rand’s father, a decorated Navy Admiral, died of influenza. The angst and conflict that comes between Beatrice and Rand was part of my own life in dealing emotionally with high risk professions. The thing about me was, I was three and four years old. My father was the county prosecuting attorney. And he was very good at his job. More than a few times I remember waking up in the back of our 1949 car, in my pajamas next to my younger brother, my father at the wheel and my mother wide awake in the passenger’s seat. My mother explained that we were on our way to her mother’s home in Florida. We weren’t on vacation. We were running from a murderer whom my father had helped to put in prison and now that man had vowed revenge on my father and all his family. No, my mother didn’t tell us all the story, but I was the MOST curious child and tip toed into my grandmother’s front parlor and hid behind the settee and eavesdropped on my parents’ conversation with my grandparents.
My father would drop us off in the middle of the night in Florida, rest for a few hours and then get back in the car and drive straight through back to Indiana which back then was a 15 hour drive. Oh, to be young with that kind of stamina, right?
Rand is a smokejumper. He’s highly trained and skilled. He’s top gun in his profession and is called back to training rookie smokejumpers in Idaho. His career also offers the same kind of despair, angst and fear that our military service men and women face when they must leave their families to go overseas—to the unknown. My respect, admiration and gratitude for all these heroes is extremely profound.
This blog tour is courtesy of: Prism Book Tours
Click through via the badge to find out what else awaits you!
Don’t forget – I read the 9th story in this series “His Baby Dilemma” which you will want to read about if your considering this series for the first time! Despite having a personal preference for reading serial fiction *in order!* and sequence of the series themselves, this was one series in-progress I was able to enter in the 9th installment and feel as if I had been involved with the characters & the heart of the series for a longer period of time! I hope if you decide to give one of the stories a chance you’ll find the same thing I had: their wicked heartwarming & cosy to read!
{SOURCES: Cover art of “His Baby Dilemma”, “Love Shadows”, “Heart’s Desire”, “A Fine Year for Love”, “Katia’s Promise”, “Fear of Falling”, “Sophie’s Path”, “Protecting the Single Mom” & “Family of His Own”, “Rescued by the Firefighter”, the synopsis for “Rescued by the Firefighter”, the author’s photo and biography as well as the Prism Book Tours badge were all provided by Prism Book Tours and used with permission. Post dividers by Fun Stuff for Your Blog via Pure Imagination. Tweets embedded by codes provided by Twitter. Blog graphics created by Jorie via Canva: Book Review Banner using Unsplash.com (Creative Commons Zero) Photography by Frank McKenna, Writerly Topics banner and the Comment Box Banner.}
Copyright © Jorie Loves A Story, 2018.
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#JorieReads | #Contemporary Romance
via #Harlequin HeartwarmingJoy of reading #ShoresOfIndianLake is how the stories are rooted in real world problems w/ authentic lives are lived & where hearts are attempting to heal. #mustread👍
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— Jorie Story 📖🎧 (@joriestory) November 7, 2018
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