Author Rene Gutteridge

Another new author I found during the summer of 2011 is Rene Gutteridge. I read two of her books, and they are as different as day and night.

Troubled Waters is the story of a woman who has not seen her parents for almost twenty years, because of a disagreement with her father. When he dies, she reluctantly goes home for the funeral.

At home she reconnects with her mother and many secrets are revealed. This almost 400 page book was hard to put down, and I ordered a copy from Amazon to send to my 92-year-old mother who reads even more than I do. What a great book.

I was delighted to see Gutteridge's name on another book at our library, so I checked it out. It was totally different--a police drama, on the order of books written by Randy Alcorn. This book, A Splitting Storm, is about storms in nature and storms in the lives of people.

Both these books are Christian fiction. I hope to be able to read more books by this author.

Author Judith Miller

I am an avid reader. It's not unusual for me to read two or three books a week. This week I picked up two books by Judith Miller at our public library, thinking they were a series. They were stand-alone books about the same subject--the Amana Colonies of the 19th century in Ohio. This was a religious communal group. They shared meals, the people were assigned jobs that benefited the community, and they had strict rules of conduct. They were somewhat like the Amish, but were a distinct sect apart from them.

The first book I read, Somewhere to Belong, was full of twists and turns. The plot was woven around two women, two secrets, and many subplots of those secrets. It kept my attention, and I read it in two days--all 364 pages.

The second book, More Than Words, centered around a young lady who was a writer. Of course, she was taught not to be prideful, and she thought she was doing wrong when she allowed someone to submit her work. I finished this 361 page book in two days, also. Judith Miller introduces plots and follows them through, sometimes with an unexpected twist.

I had not read Judith Miller's works before. I can recommend them wholeheartedly to people who like Christian fiction. Somewhere to Belong was my favorite of these two books. If you can only choose one, that would be my pick for you.

Mercy Come Morning by Lisa Bergen

Krista is a 38-year-old history professsor in a college in Colorado, but she has never forgotten her lost childhood. She grew up with an absent father and a mother who treated her indifferently. When her mother is near death in Taos, New Mexico, she reluctantly goes to be with her. Her mother never regains consciousness, but Krista battles with memories from her past. A close friend of her mother's who has always befriended her helps her to see her mother in a different way as she grows closer and closer to death from Alzheimers.

When Krista finds diaries and letters and reads them, she comes to understand her mother better and is able to clear her mind of some of the things that beset her for so long.

The imagery in this book is tremendous. Bergen's description of the countryside is colorful and alive. As Krista remembers things, she also remembers historic events, so the reader gets a history lesson as well as an enjoyable story. Krista also remembers Christmases through her life. This book's first title was Christmas Come Morning.

I received this book free from Waterbrook Multnomah for my honest review.