Legacy Redeemed

To my dear readers,
I hope you had a very Merry Christmas this year. Once I had dined with family and enjoyed their company, opened presents, etc. I actually found the time to read a book on my new "Amazon Fire" for the rest of the afternoon. I quite enjoyed the story and would love to tell you about it. :)

Where I received this book and what my interest in it is:
The title said book is Legacy Redeemed (Redeemed, Restored, Reclaimed #1) written by Aubrey Grayson. How I came into possession of this book is quite a unique situation, at least for me. Aubrey Grayson stumbled across my blog earlier this year and asked me if I would write an honest review on her book. Once I had looked into the story I agreed to this, for which she sent me the ebook for free. So a huge thanks to you Aubrey for giving me this opportunity. :)

Type of book:
Recency / Christian Fiction

Ideas expressed, message, and/or plot:
Legacy Redeemed begins with our unknown heroine entering a masquerade ball. We soon learn that her name is Susannah Blackmon. Her fiancé had recently left her and her dowry was spent entirely by her wicked guardian, Hector Dunmore. She meets a mystery man at the ball who suggests she visit the peaceful town of Seaton to stay in the Thinking Cottage until she decided what she needed to do. So she escapes her guardian and goes.
The story is told in the third person, following Susannah and the mystery man from the ball, Nicholas Daventry, the brother of an earl. When Nick's grandfather passed, he left Nick a mansion in Seaton in his will. However, Nick is a widower with a four year old son, and his grandfather's will clearly states that Nick could only inherit the mansion if he was married ON his 30th birthday, not BY his 30th. This leaves Nick three months to find a wife.
Susannah and Nicholas become acquainted outside the ballroom and soon learn that they each despise the other. How could Nicholas associate with a woman who in turn associated with Hector Dunmore, whose bad reputation was well known in London? And how could Susannah allow herself to love a man when she is a fallen woman with no dowry?
Through many circumstances, Susannah, whose father was a vicar, no longer believes in God, despite  nearly everyone she meets in Seaton claiming that she is an answer to their prayers. Towards the end of the story, Susannah tests God for proof of His existence and finds herself in a rapid change of events.
The story left me waiting for explanations that were never given. At the time that I read Legacy Redeemed, I was unaware that it was part of a yet unpublished series, which I can only hope will further explain certain aspects of the story.

Favorite scenes/quotes/lines:
My favorite character in the book was actually Gabriel who is Nick's four year old son. He did not have a huge part in the story, but I found him cute and admirable.
My favorite scenes took place in chapters 24, 25, and 26. I don't wish to say too much so I do not spoil it for anyone. However, I will say that I truly admire the romantic gesture performed by Nick as he rode back to London for uh, certain reasons. XD

Legacy Redeemed
Other books to read by Aubrey Grayson:
Legacy Redeemed is the first book written by Aubrey Grayson, but as I noted earlier, it is the first in a series as well. I don't know about you, but I hope to read them when they are published!! You can check out her Facebook page and sign up for her newsletter about when the next book is going to be published.

Additional Notes:
I personally found myself neither liking nor disliking most of the characters. I wish that me as the reader could have connected with them a bit more. However, I did really enjoy the relationship between Susannah and Gabriel.
The writing style is quite unique. While the story takes place in Regency England, much of the dialogue felt a bit modern to me and less sophisticated and formal than I expected. It gave the book a very easy read feel to it, which is actually refreshing to not have to keep a dictionary at hand.
Another thing I really appreciated about the book is that the author used many scriptural quotes from my favorite translation of the Bible, the King James Version.
I have read other Regency/Christian fiction novels and this one stands out to me a little bit from the others. I am coming to love this genre of literature and Aubrey Grayson talks about the Christian faith quite a bit more in Legacy Redeemed as compared to what other authors do in these type of books where the Christian aspect of the story is very subtle.
I really enjoyed the story of Legacy Redeemed and I hope you guys do too. Please read it for yourselves, I'd love to hear back from you to know what you think of it!! (click here to purchase Legacy Redeemed)
Thank you everyone for always reading. ;)

Yours truly,
Me

Word Count Update.

In the month of November, I participated in NaNoWriMo. I have written many short stories and novellas in the past, however, I wanted to write my first novel. I am writing a fantasy novel titled Beyond The Veil which has been a very long and amazing journey. Throughout the month of November, my novel only reached a word count of 26,000. It was not the word count I hoped for, but I strongly believe that I cannot force my words when there is no magic in them.

December has been a pretty hectic month for me. Somehow with everything that has been going on, I still manage to escape into the fantasy world of 15th century England that I have created. And let me tell you, it is such a beautiful world!! On average, it takes me 2-3 days to write 1 chapter. As of last Sunday, I have been writing nearly 1-2 chapters A DAY.  I love my story and my characters even more with each chapter I write.

Currently my word count is at 38,000. My goal is to no longer reach the NaNo word count goal of 50,000 words. I have no goal. The story will end where it will end. I am not pushing myself to a certain number; I am just writing what comes to mind. It is my guess, not my hope, that the story will end around 55,000 or 57,000 words based on where my word count is now.

I am very excited with my progress so far, I hope you are as well!! As I near the end of the book, I'll be sharing more about the story and what my next steps are. Until next time, take care and stay warm!! Thank you for reading. ;)

Yours truly,

Me.

NaNo Is Over.

Hey everyone!!
November is over, December is here and that means I'm back!! I participated in NaNoWriMo last month and took a break from my blog. I hope to find all of my readers here as well. I have a quick update for you!

As many of you may know, NaNo encourages people to write a 50k word novel within the month of November. While I did not finish my novel, Beyond The Veil, in November, I have been encouraged to stay motivated to keep writing which is exactly why I participated at all.

I just want to say that I am not a coffee drinker. I don't really like the way coffee tastes. This month, however, I drank a total of 2 coffees which is a big deal for me. I was also sick at the beginning of the month and I got sick again near the end of the month. I guess that's what little sleep does to a person. ;)

Last month began very slowly for me. It took me about an entire week to get into the full swing of things and really begin to focus on my writing. Sadly, I only attended 1 write in during the entire month. I did, however, meet a few other writers in person. It was nice to hear what other writers are working on and how they go about it, what inspired them, etc.

As I said before, I did not finish Beyond The Veil in November. I will keep you guessing as to what exactly my progress is like, but will say that I am officially over the halfway word count mark. If I continue to keep this pace, I hope to be finished with this book near the end of December. I'm super excited about it; I hope you guys are as well!!

It's great to have you all back in the loop ;) I'll do my best to keep you up to date on my writing progress. Thank you so much for reading!!

Yours truly,
Me