Blog Book Tour | New #PictureBook by Catherine Christensen and a workbook to encourage children to feel spiritually renewed!

Posted Tuesday, 27 September, 2016 by jorielov , , , , , , 0 Comments

Illustrated Stories Banner created by Jorie in Canva.

Acquired Book By: I am a regular tour hostess for blog tours via Cedar Fort whereupon I am thankful to have such a diverse amount of novels and non-fiction titles to choose amongst to host. I received a complimentary copy of “Blessing the Nephite Children” and “The Holy Ghost” direct from the publisher CFI (imprint of Cedar Fort, Inc) in exchange for an honest review. I did not receive compensation for my opinions or thoughts shared herein.

Why I love Catherine Christensen Children’s Books:

The illustrations are bright and vivid, a true eclipse of childhood – painting together a young girl and her family, as they find time to pray amongst the hours they are living. It’s wonderful to see how varied a young girl’s prayers can be and how prayer by definition can be for a multitude of things; both seen and unseen. The illustrator matches keenly to the writer’s ability to offer a guide of possibilities to children; to take the guesswork out of what constitutes a prayer and where you need to be whilst you pray.

It’s a lively conversation waiting to be spoken between a child and their parents, where an open dialogue about sharing how parents approach their prayer life and how their child can approach theirs will be easily obtained after reading this beautiful picture book together! I love how the story is a celebration of what we can share within our prayers as much as how grounded our lives become through prayer.

I love learning books – always have – even when I was a child, because they help expand your world as much as they help re-define the world as well. You get to grow through the knowledge your internalising and in this particular case, I liked how the lesson was breaking down how prayer can become an active habit without complications, because prayer is portable and as convenient as remaining mindful about your thoughts and your emotions.

-quoted from my review of I Can Pray Everyday

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Blog Book Tour | New #PictureBook by Catherine Christensen and a workbook to encourage children to feel spiritually renewed!Blessing the Nephite Children
by Catherine Christensen
Illustrator/Cover Designer: Jane Delve
Source: Direct from Publisher

Snuggle up with your kids and learn about Jesus’s visit to the Nephites. This colorful board book is perfectly designed for little fingers and small attention spans. Experience the beauty of Christ’s personal love in the Book of Mormon with your little ones and come to see the ways the Savior reaches out to them today.

Genres: Children's Literature, Artistic Adaptations &/or Picture Books



Places to find the book:

Add to LibraryThing

ISBN: 9781462118755

Also by this author: I Can Pray Everyday

Published by CFI (imprint) Cedar Fort Inc

on 1st August, 2016

Format: Hardcover Edition

Published By: CFI (imprint) of Cedar Fort Inc (@CedarFortBooks),

an imprint of Cedar Fort, Inc (@CedarFortBooks)
Available Formats: Hardback, Ebook

Converse via: #picturebook, #KidsLit

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Posted Tuesday, 27 September, 2016 by jorielov in Blog Tour Host, Cedar Fort Publishing & Media, Children's Literature, Illustrations for Stories, Indie Author, Picture Book

Blog Book Tour | “Reclamation” (duology) by Adrienne Quintana The continuing saga of Jace Vega started inside the page-turner “ERUPTION”!

Posted Friday, 23 September, 2016 by jorielov , , , , 0 Comments

Ruminations & Impressions Book Review Banner created by Jorie in Canva.

Acquired Book By: Originally my path crossed with Ms Quintana whilst I participated on the blog tour (via Cedar Fort Publishing & Media) for her debut novel “Eruption” wherein I found a compelling and tightly written technothriller with a heap of heart and suspense! After the blog tour, the author and I kept in touch as I was most curious about a potential sequel and I had hoped to feature her on my blog with an interview. Fast forward, Ms Quintana has since established her own publishing company (Pink Umbrella Books) and invited me to join the excitement of her duology sequel “Reclamation”. Quite overjoyed to learn what became of Jace Vega, I instantly agreed!

I received a complimentary copy of “Reclamation” direct from the publisher Pink Umbrella Books in exchange for an honest review. I did not receive compensation for my opinions or thoughts shared herein.

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Why I loved reading ERUPTION:

Quintana breathes life into her novel within the first few pages of Eruption grounding the reader askance Jace as she goes about her routine to envelope herself inside her run; blocking out the world and the absence of memory from her dreams. It is an internal check-balance of seeing Jace from the moment she awakens to how she likes to stablise her life with routine. This is a girl who is adamant about routine and having a ‘neat and tidy approach to living’ wherein she would not grow surprised by any event, incident, or moment arriving up out of the blue! Not that that is characteristic of life but you can gather a sense of her character’s intentions through the anguish she feels on the death of her Mum. There is only a slight reference to this, but Quintana is a writer who can give depth to a few words; evoking a strong reaction out of her reader and characters alike.

Jace is at the apex of suspending her world between her current reality and the reality of how the future is intersecting with her present. The curious bit for me is how her present self is having trouble processing the future, as she’s approaching it from a rational point of view vindictive of someone who accepts plausible science fiction stories but hasn’t taken her belief to the point where she can fathom how ‘real’ science fiction scenarios can bleed into your own reality.

Eruption proves that you can formulate a new bridge between where techno-thrillers can merge quite beautifully with a time travel narrative arc, and this is a credit to Quintana whose given us a debut novel that entices you to seek out the continuing chapters inside this duology! Quintana included ‘just enough’ current events and tidbits of our modern 21st Century to encourage a balance of ‘when’ and ‘where’ the story takes place whilst providing a backdrop that we can instantly relate too as we read her debut. It was quasi-political without being a complete politico novel!

-quoted from my review of ERUPTION

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Blog Book Tour | “Reclamation” (duology) by Adrienne Quintana The continuing saga of Jace Vega started inside the page-turner “ERUPTION”!Reclamation
Subtitle: Foreknowledge is power
by Adrienne Quintana
Source: Direct from Publisher

Sequel to Eruption, A Technothriller Exploring the Power of Foreknowledge and the Dangers of Technology Dependence.

When Jace Vega wakes up three years after the eruption of Mount Hood, her life is in turmoil. The future seems to match the images on the tablet, but Corey is missing, and nothing about her relationship with Damien feels right.

As Victor Trent continues to amass power, using information terrorism to make the world dependent on Omnibus technology and his private military force, Omnibus Global Security, Jace knows she doesn’t have much time if she’s going to stop him.

Jace’s reawakening begins a race to the place where it all began: the Point of Origin.
If she can only remember where it is.

Genres: Science Fiction, Techno-Thriller, Time Travel Fiction



Places to find the book:

Add to LibraryThing

ISBN: 9781523772148

Also by this author: Eruption

Series: Eruption Duology


Also in this series: Eruption


Published by Pink Umbrella Books

on 13th September, 2016

Format: Trade Paperback

Pages: 295

Published By: Pink Umbrella Books (@PinkUmbrellaBks)
Available Formats: Paperback, Ebook

Converse on Twitter via: #EruptionDuology, #ReclamationBook

About Adrienne Quintana

Adrienne Quintana is the second of nine children born to professional oil artist, John Horejs, and his wife and business partner, Elaine. She spent her early years playing on the banks of the Snake River in southern Idaho while her father built a geodesic dome house. When the family wasn’t traveling around the country to art shows, Adrienne spent many happy hours reading in her unfinished, tent-like bedroom. Love of reading soon blossomed into a desire to write. If the family’s antiquated computer could be resurrected, a collection of short stories involving local characters and their epic battles with fire-breathing dragons would be sure to entertain.

After completing high school via correspondence, Adrienne studied Music Education at Mesa Community College. She took an 18 month break to serve a church mission in Montreal, Canada, where she gained invaluable life experiences and a few pounds from the local delicacies. After the completion of her mission and a month abroad in Europe, Adrienne moved to Utah with the intention of continuing her education at Brigham Young University, but these plans were short-lived when she met her husband-to-be while working at an investment company. Soon after their marriage, the Quintanas packed up and moved to Minnesota, where Adrienne worked while her husband earned a Law degree.

After four children and a move to Arizona, Adrienne completed her Bachelors of Science and Communication at the University of Phoenix. In the throes of housekeeping, potty-training, and carpooling, Adrienne discovered that she could find time to accomplish her goals—often in the quiet hours after the children were in bed. Since her graduation in 2012, those quiet moments have been used to fulfill a life-long dream of becoming a writer.

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on re-aligning into the mind Of Jace:

I posted my review of ERUPTION on the 31st of January, 2015 and this September, 2016 I re-read the story in order to better re-align myself inside the mind of Jace Vega!

Memory is both elusive and ironic – I remember the feeling of urgency when I first read ERUPTION. The irony is that I feel like I’ve lived a lifetime since I read this story – yet it was only one year and nine months ago! I’d equae that to how I felt picking up The Clan Chronicles after nine months! There are moments where we place our memories on pause – especially those attached to stories, to the lives of characters we connect too – and then, someone encourages us to resume where we had left off.

I felt like Jace – I knew I had read these opening sentences where we find her jogging ahead of her work hours in the morning but it wasn’t until she reached for the discarded tablet that the pieces of her story started to ‘re-align’. Similar as said to the Clan – memories you etch into your heart, leave imprinted data and blessedly we can return to where we were originally. Yet, sometimes I like to humour my curiosity and re-read the familiar yet not altogether remember the passages before resuming a series or in this case a duology (two stories anchoured and aligned together). Jace in ERUPTION felt intense waves of deja vu where she would automatically feel as if she were re-living sequences of her everyday life and/or that  portion of her life was bleeding into the future or the future was blending into her present, depending on how you perceived her story as it unfolded. Read More

Reading this book contributed to these challenges:

  • #FuellYourSciFi
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Posted Friday, 23 September, 2016 by jorielov in #JorieLovesIndies, 21st Century, Blog Tour Host, Cedar Fort Publishing & Media, Debut Author, Debut Novel, Equality In Literature, Indie Author, Jorie Loves A Story Cuppa Book Love Awards, Modern Day, Multi-cultural Characters and/or Honest Representations of Ethnicity, Science Fiction, Time Travel, Young Adult Fiction

Book Spotlight | “Between Sisters” by Cathy Kelly Jorie starts a convo about how reading certain stories can be affected by certain (emotional) triggers.

Posted Thursday, 22 September, 2016 by jorielov , , , 2 Comments

Stories Sailing into View Banner created by Jorie in Canva.

Acquired Book By: I am a new reviewer for Hachette Books and their imprints, I started by reviewing releases by FaithWords (the novels of Stephanie Grace Whitson), their INSPY (Inspirational Fiction) imprint of releases focusing on uplifting and spiritual stories which are a delight to read whilst engaging your mind in life affirming and heart-centered stories. I found Hachette via Edelweiss at the conclusion of [2015] and have been blessed to start reviewing for them.

I received a complimentary copy of “Between Sisters” direct from the publisher Grand Central Publishing (an imprint of Hachette Book Group Inc.) in consideration for an honest review. I did not receive compensation for my opinions or thoughts shared herein.

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On selecting “Between Sisters”:

After I reviewed “Two Across”, I was given a few choices of upcoming releases from which to select which books I might be interested in reading. This particular title stood out to me on several fronts – as I truly love reading Women’s Fiction which seeks to have a strong dramatic core of heart as much as I love reading stories set outside my country. I do not oft get the chance to pick up an Irish novel and as the country is part of my ancestral past, it is one that holds my literary curiosity!

This is my first reading of Irish novelist Cathy Kelly, as I was quite excited about reading my first story by Ms Kelly as I was hoping it would lead to more readings of her novels. What I had foreseen going into the novel was a story that was fused by sisterhood friendships, shared memories and the highs/lows of how life can be both wicked exhilarating or move us through a series of life lessons where our personal growth is both tested and renewed. However, I was not quite prepared for how the novel opened, which is why instead of reviewing this novel, I wanted to open my post to a discussion about how sometimes the stories we seek out to read are sometimes the ones we have an inability to connect too.

I am thankful to the publicist at Grand Central who understood where I was coming from in regards to not being able to read this novel, but also, that I wanted to spotlight the novel to my readers whilst giving the explanation about what caused me to step out of the story.

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Book Spotlight | “Between Sisters” by Cathy Kelly Jorie starts a convo about how reading certain stories can be affected by certain (emotional) triggers.Between Sisters

Meet the women of Delaney Gardens, a bustling suburban village in the outer reaches of Dublin. There's Cassie, who's spent her married life doing everything right for her children, husband, and mother-in-law, yet feels so exhausted that "wine o'clock" comes a littler earlier each afternoon.

There's her sister Coco, who runs a vintage dress shop, but has avoided the complications of romantic commitment. Watching over them is their grandmother Pearl, who, despite caring deeply for her family, is contending with a long-buried secret. And then there's Elsa, the polished face of daytime TV, who's triumphed over demons before, but is now facing her toughest battle yet. At every crossroad these women face, readers are taken deeper into the heart of what it means to be a family.


Places to find the book:

Add to LibraryThing

Find on Book Browse

ISBN: 9781455540853

on 9th August, 2016

Length: 870

Pages: 464

Published by: Grand Central Publishing (@GrandCentralPub)
an imprint of Hachette Book Group, Inc. (@HachetteBooks)

Formats Available: Trade Paperback, Audiobook and Ebook

Converse via: #IrishFiction & #WomensFiction

+ use these two in combo: #Contemporary #Romance

Read an inspiring article on Cathy Kelly from Irish Central (about Between Sisters)

About Cathy Kelly

Cathy Kelly Photo Credit: Barry McCall

Cathy Kelly is published around the world, with millions of copies of her books in print. A #1 bestseller in the UK, Ireland, and Australia, she is one of Ireland's best-loved storytellers. Kelly lives with her husband, their young twin sons, and three dogs in County Wicklow, Ireland.

Photo Credit: Barry McCall

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Posted Thursday, 22 September, 2016 by jorielov in Bits & Bobbles of Jorie, Blog Tour Host, Book Spotlight, Grand Central Publishing, Realistic Fiction