The Messenger

I signed up to be a review for Bethany House publishing about two months ago. You can sign up here. The first book I signed up to receive was "The Messenger" by Siri Mitchell.

The book is a historical fiction set during the Revolutionary War. I'm a huge fan of historical fiction, but I've never read a book set during this era. Here is the book description from Amazon.com. "Hannah Sunderland felt content in her embrace of the Quaker faith ...until her twin brother ran off and joined the army and ended up captured and in jail. Suddenly Hannah's world turns on end. She longs to bring her brother some measure of comfort in the squalid, frigid prison where he remains. But the Quakers believe they are not to take sides, not to take up arms. Can she sit by and do nothing while he suffers? Jeremiah Jones has an enormous task before him. Responsibility for a spy ring is now his, and he desperately needs access to the men in prison, whom they are seeking to free. A possible solution is to garner a pass for Hannah. But while she is fine to the eye, she holds only disdain for him--and agreeing would mean disobeying those she loves and abandoning a bedrock of her faith. With skill and sensitivity, Mitchell tells a story of two unlikely heroes seeking God's voice, finding the courage to act, and discovering the powerful embrace of love." I have to say that this book was so slow to start out with. I had a hard time keeping with it. If it were not for the fact that I was reviewing this book, I may not have finished. But.... I'm glad I did. The author did spend her sweet time setting the book up, but about 3/4 of the way through the book I found that I couldn't put it down. In fact, at the end of the book I was sad to see that it was over. I think she wrapped it up well though. The whole beginning of the book sets up who the characters are and how they are so different from each other, as well as some important parts of their past that will be brought up periodically throughout the book. The middle part focuses a lot on their love/hate relationship as well as how the whole spy thing is going. My favorite part of course is when it started getting good. That was at the end of the book when all of the scoot to the edge of your seat and don't put the book down stuff started to happen. Overall, it was very interesting and I'll be looking for more historical fiction based on this time period. I will also be looking for other books by this author to determine if she'll be an author that I will continue to read. *I did get the copy of this book for free, but otherwise I am not being paid for this review.

I'm back! We'll see how long it last. It's been almost a year since my last post. AJ is four and Emily will be 2 at the end of this month. Let's see, what has happened since I was here last? I got a job as a teacher. AJ started preschool. We've moved like twice, but have found a place that we really really like. Emily is my prissy little princess with a feisty attitude! My friend Hannah was shot and killed. The situation with Hannah is still a very hard subject for me. It's been about two months since she has passed, and I can't shake the pain I still feel from it. It's hard because I pass by her grave every day on my way to work. I don't know how long it's going to take, but it feels wrong to be so hurt. Hannah and I hadn't been close for awhile before this. We use to be super close to the point where I went on vacation with them and spent the night like every other night. But there was a 7 year age difference, and I got married and had kids. She started dating a boy and going out with friend more around her age. It was just a comfortable space between us. I hope and think that she knew she could come to me for anything, and every once and awhile I would check up on her. When I got the phone call that Hannah had been shot. I think I was in shock because my first thought was not where or even toward the idea that she could die. I believe my first question was how? I started to freak out a little bit, and my mom came to check on me and I told her what happened. She was the one that asked me where. I was told it was her head, but it didn't really affect me yet. I went to my friends house to pick her up so we could go to the hospital. We had arrived at the hospital, but hadn't made it in yet when we found out that she had less than a one percent chance of survival. THAT was when I started freaking out. I stayed as long as I could over the weeks time she was in the hospital. I stayed there the first three days only getting about 6 hours of sleep, and I hadn't even gotten to see her yet. I just couldn't leave the hospital. I left to see my kids, change my clothes, and to cry. I wanted to see Hannah so bad that I convinced myself that I couldn't cry around anyone because I had to show how strong I was so they would let me in. Once I decided that I wasn't going to cry, I rarely did. Even to the point where I wanted to cry and I couldn't. At her funeral, I didn't cry. At her memorial service, it was her dancing ballet that made me cry but not a good let it out kind of cry. Even at her grave, I get teary eyed but that's it. The big break down moment that I had, and of course I tried my best to be quiet, but it was in church when Pastor Kelley spoke for the first time since she was shot. It's a month and a half later and I cry every once and awhile at night while I am by myself. I am really grateful because I was able to see Hannah's body before she passed. I was able to kiss her hand. I was able to talk to her. I say I saw Hannah's body because I still believe that Hannah had left her body at that point. For someone who was shot in the head, she didn't look it. She was absolutely beautiful, but I didn't get the feeling that if I talked to her she would be listening. She had moved onto Heaven. I was afraid that I was going to get in the way, and I left the room. I wish that I had stayed. I feel like I didn't get enough time. I feel like I want to go to her house and sit in her room. Sitting at the grave doesn't give me the feeling like I'm close to her. I want to be in the places that she was. I think there are acouple of issues that I still have problems with and this is why I can't get over it. First, I have a very vivid imagination (I blame it on my love for reading), and I can imagine myself in her mom's shoes. I can actually replaces Hannah's face with Emily's. I say that "I can" like it's something that I try to do, but it's kind of like flash blacks when it happens. The pain that I feel is actually physical and it makes my chest hurt very badly. The idea that death is so permanent is hard for me. Hannah's mom and dad can't hug her again, they can't talk, etc. etc. All the things that a parent should be able to do to their child, and their child is gone. I couldn't live if anything happened to either of my children.