Quick Review: "The Lady's Slipper" by Deborah Swift

From Goodreads: 1660. King Charles II has returned from exile, but memories of the English Civil War still rankle. There are old scores to settle, and religious differences threaten to overturn a fragile peace. When Alice Ibbetson discovers a rare orchid, the Lady’s Slipper, growing in a wood belonging to Richard Wheeler, she is captivated by its beauty— though Wheeler, a Quaker, is determined to keep the flower where God intended it to grow. Knowing that the orchid is the last of its kind, she steals the flower, little dreaming that her seemingly simple act will set off a chain of events that will lead to murder and exile, and change her life forever…

My Thoughts: The Lady's Slipper was not at all what I expected it to be but it wound up being a decent read. The story took me a while to get into. It started very abruptly and I couldn't understand what was going on and why Alice decided to steal the flower. It was only after I had read a bit that I began to see where the story is going.

The story takes place not long after the Restoration in England. Alice kind of seemed like a secondary character as the story mostly focuses on the battles between the Quakers and the Royalists. Alice stealing the lady's slipper kind of became part of the background as all of the other events played out. I don't know much about this time period so it was interesting to see how even after the Restoration, the tensions were still very high among everyday people. I liked the characters but it felt like it took a really long time to get to know them. I didn't really start liking Alice and Wheeler until I was about half way through the book.

Overall, the story was unique and interesting but I feel like there could have been so much more to it. 3 stars.

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Review and Giveaway: "Distant Signs" by Anne Richter

Synopsis: Distant Signs is an intimate portrait of two families spanning three generations amidst turbulent political change, behind and beyond the Berlin Wall. In 1960s East Germany, Margret, a professor’s daughter from the city, meets and marries Hans, from a small village in Thuringia. The couple struggle to contend with their different backgrounds, and the emotional scars they bear from childhood in the aftermath of war. As East German history gradually unravels, with collision of the personal and political, their two families’ hidden truths are quietly revealed. An exquisitely written novel with strongly etched characters that stay with you long after the book is finished and an authentic portrayal of family life behind the iron curtain based on personal experience of the author who is East German and was 16 years old at the fall of the Berlin Wall. Why do families repeat destructive patterns of behaviour across generations? Should the personal take precedence over...

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Happy Sunday everybody! September is over and I can hardly believe it. It seems as though the month has flown by. Now I'm excited for fall and all of the upcoming holidays. October is the start of my favorite time of year and I'm hoping there will be plenty of room for reading in between all of the upcoming events. I requested some new holiday books from the library and had no idea all of my holds would come in at once so I need to get moving on these. I'm really excited to dig into some sweet, fluffy reads and these will do just the trick. From the Library: A Snow Country Christmas by Linda Lael Miller This is the fourth book in a series that I really enjoyed so I'm eager to get started on it. Holly and Ivy by Fern Michaels The Christmas Room by Catherine Anderson I was so intrigued by the cover on this one that I had to pick it up. For Review (from NetGalley): I Was Anastasia by Ariel Lawhon ...

So Many Books, So Little Time

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