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Fire by Night by Teresa MessineoFire by Night by Teresa Messineo


Although I do read other book genres, historical fiction is my favorite.  World War II is my top favorite and I tend to read a lot, both fiction and non-fiction.  When I heard about ‘Fire By Night’ at a webinar with the publisher, I knew I had to read it.

Fire By Night is a bit different than many WWII books out there.  Its focus is on two American Military nurses that served near two different war fronts.  Jo and Kay are from two very different parts of the U.S.  Jo is from Brooklyn and Kay from a small town.  However, in training they become fast friend and hope to serve together.  That does not happen.  Kay is sent to the Pacific and attends party after party and soaks in the sun.  Jo is sent to France and is jealous that her friend is having so much fun. 

The fun does not last for Kay.  Once Pearl Harbour is bombed, the “endless” parties cease and the war with Japan begins.  Kay’s story starts in the Japanese POW camp in Manila that she is now in.  Jo’s unit is moving out because their make shift hospital is now part of the front.  However, not everyone can move out at once and Jo is left to tend 6 badly wounded soldiers alone with just one elderly doctor.  They know the trucks will be back for them soon but then here there was an attack and the road has a big hole in it and the trucks can’t get through.  Soon the doctor dies and Jo is left on her own to tend to the men.

Told in turns, we join Jo and Kay during their terrifying ordeals and there aftermath. I connected with both Jo and Kay and rooted for them to survive.  Both are strong female and heroic characters!  This is Teresa Messineo’s first novel but you wouldn’t know that from reading it.  She has a strong command in character development, prose, and a sense of time and place.  With each chapter, I was instantly transported from Manila to France smoothly.  I felt like I was both places, experiencing what Kay and Jo were experiencing.  I hope that Ms. Messineo continues writing because I would love to read more by her!  I highly recommend ‘Fire by Night’.  It really has something for everyone; war, survival, terror, and even a bit of romance.

5/5 WWII fiction at it’s finest!

I received the ebook galley for Edelweiss for my honest review.

About Teresa MessineoFire by Night by Teresa Messineo


Teresa Messineo is an outspoken woman whose passionate social interest and positions have been featured in a special documentary, a World War II photo shoot and photographic notice in the New York Times – click on the link to read one such article, page 14: http://www.desales.edu/docs/default-source/desales-university-magazine/fall-20131eea1ec6cd0568828f7cff0000a3869d.pdf?sfvrsn=2

Teresa was alternatively schooled until her Freshman year, after which she transferred to a conventional high school. An honor student there, she earned a full scholarship to DeSales University where she ultimately won the Ross Baker Award for Excellence in Writing, that university’s highest honor for writing. She graduated with a BA in English in 1994, with minors in Biology and Theology, and earned her ICCE and LIBSS while teaching at Pennsylvania’s premier birthing center. Teresa passes on her love of learning through home schooling, even as she keeps an eye on medical missionary work for herself after she finishes educating her own kids. Teresa combines her love of medicine and writing in The Fire by Night.

Teresa is highly motivated about social justice and sticking up for the underdog. She volunteers at a food bank and is a ‘volunteer actor’ at her local hospital during disaster drills. She is the mother of four children, whom she has exclusively home schooled (her eldest son earned a scholarship to her own alma mater). Teresa’s other interests include swing dancing, travel, studying Italian, performing in a Philippine dance troupe, playing Irish Tenor Banjo in a Celtic band, and personal fitness – she swims in her YMCA’s 100 Mile Club (2014 marked her first year swimming the IronMan distance), takes Tabata class and competes in several obstacle mud runs each year. A voracious reader (she has read 2,397 books since completing college) and lifetime learner, Teresa’s motto is, ‘We learn from our mistakes.’

In This Life by Christine BraeIn This Life by Christine Brae


Thanks to Erika Lopez of Meryl Moss Media, I am giving away one print copy of In This Life by Christine Brae.

Description of In This Life by Christine Brae


Secrets ruin lives, and lies protect those secrets…

Wanting to escape her life in New York City before starting medical school in the fall, Anna Dillon convinces her best friend Dante to travel with her to Thailand on a medical mission. While volunteering in a coastal village recently ravaged by a tsunami, Anna meets Jude Grayson. They share an instant attraction that leads to a brief, passionate affair. When she has to rush home for a family emergency, he promises to stay in touch.

But Jude never calls, and Anna tries desperately to forget him.

Five years pass, and Anna finally moves on with Dante after giving up hope that Jude will ever return—until they come face to face again in a chance encounter. Reeling, Anna discovers the life-altering secret of why Jude never contacted her—and why they can’t be together. But the passion that ignited between them on an exotic beach years ago never died, making it impossible to stay away from each other.

And Dante? Anna discovers that the friend she grew to love—and trust—has a secret of his own.

About Christine BraeIn This Life by Christine Brae


CHRISTINE BRAE After the release of her first two novels, The Light in the Wound and His Wounded Light, Brae never imagined that her words would touch so any people. Her third novel,Insipid, is a standalone that was released in June 2014. She lives in Chicago, with her husband and three children.

Giveaway of In This Life by Christine Brae


This giveaway is open to the U.S. only and ends on February 10, 2017 midnight pacific time.  Entries are accepted via Rafflecopter only.

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Games of Make-Believe by Julie Ann WambachGames of Make-Believe by Julie Ann Wambach


Thanks to Rebecca Brown of  Cadence Group, I am giving away one print copy of Games of Make-Believe by Julie Ann Wambach.

Description of Games of Make-Believe by Julie Ann Wambach


Julie Ann Wambach, an Arizona resident for fifty years, sets her new book, Games of Make-Believe, in the early Phoenix, Arizona, area where the population by 1990 had grown by seven and half times of that in 1960. During these years, the explosive building boom and rapid cultural changes brought by an influx of diverse people from many other parts of the country imposed a heavy price tag on residents. For Dr. Wambach, a retired college professor whose early writings were primarily in the academic arena, this is her first work of fiction.

Amidst the 1960-1990 Phoenix transformation, the Prince family struggles to create what we now call a “blended family” before they ever heard the term. When a prosperous gentleman convinces her to marry him, Bella’s arduous existence suddenly holds the promise of enchantment. Thus begins twenty-eight stories, some in the style of a romantic fairytale, others of a comedy or a tragedy. Together, the stories explore the role of make-believe in a dysfunctional stepfamily trying to make sense of their lives in the changing community around them.

At the center of the family discord is the daughter who Bella’s husband brings into the marriage. Renata immediately rejects her new stepmother and two stepsisters. No one knows how to unify this group. As an adult survivor of child abuse, Bella struggles to create a convincing self-identity within her new husband’s affluent world. Her take-charge approach to running the family convinces others, but not herself. In an effort to make sense of it all, Bella latches onto a series of religions and pop psychologies, while her husband wholly devotes himself to the intense competition surrounding his flourishing home development business. 

About Julie Ann WambachGames of Make-Believe by Julie Ann Wambach


A retired college professor whose publications were primarily academic, Dr. Julie Ann Wambach offers her first work of fiction, Games of Make-Believe. She was born in Wisconsin to a large family and has always been interested in the dynamics of both her own family and those of her friends and acquaintances.

Having lived in Arizona for 50 years, Wambach knew Phoenix when it was a sleepy community and she watched the changes in size and population makeup as it grew into a huge metropolitan area. How these changes affected families led Wambach to create a work of fiction wherein a family with roots from outside Arizona struggled to make sense of who they were and how they might fit into the this complicated new world.

While their two grown children have settled elsewhere, Dr. Wambach and her husband still live in the Phoenix area.

Giveaway of Games of Make-Believe by Julie Ann Wambach


This giveaway is open to the Contiguous U.S. and ends on January 27, 2017 midnight pacific time.  Entries are accepted via Rafflecopter only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway