Monday, October 31, 2016

Song of Blessing #4

From This Day Forward (Song of Blessing #4) 

Deborah MacCallister, head nurse at the Blessing hospital, has loved Toby Valders since her school days, but she's had enough of their on-again, off-again relationship. Toby truly cares for Deborah, but he's never felt like he could commit to marriage or a family.
When Anton Genddarm, the new schoolteacher, comes to town, the young women of Blessing see a chance to force Toby's hand with a little strategic matchmaking. But real sparks fly between Deborah and Anton, and she finds herself in an even more complicated situation. The attention she gets from Anton makes Toby do some serious soul-searching, but is it too late?
Then Deborah receives an invitation to study the latest advances in nursing at a hospital in Chicago, and she faces a hard choice. To leave or stay? Should she give up on the dream of Toby and accept the interest of Anton?



Published October 4th 2016
 by Bethany House Publishers 

Available for Purchase:




Meet the Author:

 
ward-winning and best selling author Lauraine Snelling began living her dream to be a writer with her first published book for young adult readers, Tragedy on the Toutle, in 1982. She has since continued writing more horse books for young girls, adding historical and contemporary fiction and nonfiction for adults and young readers to her repertoire. All told, she has over eighty books published.
 
Author Lauraine Snelling Press Photo 2Shown in her contemporary romances and women’s fiction, a hallmark of Lauraine’s style is writing about real issues of forgiveness, loss, domestic violence, and cancer within a compelling story. Her work has been translated into Norwegian, Danish, and German, and she has won the Romantic Times Career Achievement award for Inspirational Fiction, the Silver Angel Award for An Untamed Land and a Romance Writers of America Golden Heart for Song of Laughter.

As a sought after speaker, Lauraine encourages others to find their gifts and live their lives with humor and joy. Her readers clamor for more books more often, and Lauraine would like to comply ... if only her paintbrushes and easel didn’t call quite so loudly.
Lauraine and her husband, Wayne, have two grown sons, and live in the Tehachapi Mountains with a watchdog Basset named Winston. They love to travel, most especially in their forty-foot motor coach, which they affectionately deem “a work in progress”.


My Thoughts:

Lauraine Snelling brings us the 4th installment in her Song of Blessing series.  
I would say that reading the previous books would be helpful when reading this book.  This is the first book of Ms. Snelling's I have read so at the first of this book I felt somewhat lost as to the characters.  Needless to say the first of the book was somewhat difficult to get into, but I pressed on and soon was immersed in the story.  This  is Deborah MacCallister's story.  She is the head nurse at Blessings Hospital and I found her very interesting since I, myself, am a nurse.  It always fascinates me about the medical field historically.  This story focuses on family and the strong values brought from Norway.  We find that Deborah has loved Toby Valders since she was a young girl, but their on again off again relationship leads one to believe that maybe Toby isn't as committed as Deborah.  Deborah makes a decision that she will give Toby through the summer, but at the end she will decide whether to give up on him completely.  
 
This is a sweet plot that flows effortlessly. Though the pace is consistent I also found it somewhat slow.    I love the community and how they come together.   This is a well written story and brings  a variety of secondary characters that are well integrated.  I wish I had of read the first books of the series so I would have gotten the full impact of the series.  
**I received this book from the publisher as part of their book bloggers program.  
All thoughts and opinions are my own.   
 

 

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