This is a profound little book. Lysa takes you through her personal journey and struggles to overcome rejection and feeling unwanted.

If you are a perfectionist, like myself, this book is a must-read. I saw myself in her words so many times. I couldn’t read it fast enough and it will remain in my next-read pile to re-read over and over. 

Lysa provides her personal stories and weaves into them words from the Bible and the promises contained within. Here’s a quote that resonated with me:

This passage is in a chapter called When Our Normal Gets Snatched”.  Lysa writes on and finally concludes the chapter with this: “The only thing I’ve seen work in my life to protect my heart from these deep wounds is the constant pursuit of the sweetest grace.”

Grab this book. Read it all at once. Or read it in small sips. Annotate it. Apply it to your circumstances whatever they might be.

But read it.

Finally, a typical John Grisham book!

I have been a fan of his from his very first book- who else remembers The Rainmaker and then The Pelican Brief? I think those were his first two. That was many years ago and he has published some clunkers since then, but this one was great!

The Whistler is the story of Lacy, an attorney for the Florida Board of Judicial Conduct. She is contacted by a man that knows some secrets about Treasure Key which is a casino organization run by the Tappacola tribe. Her informant gets his information from a go-between and that person gets info from a mole. It’s all very complicated as you learn about all the back characters and read along as Lacy and her partner Hugo, and then her new FBI partner Allie, race to pin the bad guys with extortion, money laundering, bribery, and murder. It’s a fast paced page-turner that has some surprises along the way. You will enjoy it!

Amazing! I am a fan of this author (most of the time). I still remember reading 

Nineteen Minutes many years ago and being totally mesmerized by it. 

This one is the story of Ruth, a black woman and a nurse in labor and delivery. Ruth examines a newborn one day only to be told by its father that she may never touch his son again. Dad is a devout believer in white supremacy and does not want an African American taking care of his child. (And the term African American is not the one he uses!) Some hours later Ruth finds herself alone with the baby and when he stops breathing she is torn about what to do. Should she help the baby or not touch him as she has been ordered by the head nurse? When the baby dies some minutes later Ruth is caught up in the tragedy and accused of killing the baby. 

The book alternates between Ruth as the narrator, Turk (the dad) as the narrator, and Kennedi, Ruth’s lawyer as the narrator. It’s quite a story and being told in three voices adds to the drama.

I listened to this book and I am so glad I did. The audio version has three different people reading- a different “voice” for each and this made it perfect. This is a book you need to read! There are some twists throughout and especially at the end that were just brilliant. I highly recommend it!

I would also suggest you listen to it!

Do you subscribe to Audible? It’s an Amazon program for purchasing audio books. You pay a monthly fee to earn credits and each credit provides one book. The credits roll over each month and here’s the best part: If you start listening to a book and don’t like it or the narrator, you can “return” the book. It is credited back to your account!

Use my affiliate link below and you can get two audible books for free. I download these to my IPhone and listen to them on my commute to work!

The Couple Next Door is about Anne and Marco who go next door to a party and leave their infant daughter unattended. They take turns checking on her every half hour and have a baby monitor they can listen to. At the 1:00 am check-in Anne discovers the baby is gone. What follows is a race against time as the couple try to find out what happened to their daughter. When a ransom is demanded they turn to Anne’s parents who seem to have quite a bit of money. Marco takes 3 million in cash to meet with the kidnapper and then……… I can’t tell you anymore, but, just trust me.

Read this one! It’s like Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train with amazing twists and turns. Just when you think you have it solved something else happens! Definitely 5 stars!!

If you have read the first three books in this series, then you will love this book. I would definitely recommend that you read those first. Don’t fret- they are quick reads because they are so fast-paced and you will not want to put them down.

Mind you, this fourth book was not written by the original author (due to his death), but you will never notice it. The writing style is pretty much the same.

This one is the story of  a journalist, Mikael Blomkvist, and the GIRL. Lisbeth Salander is featured in all the books and is a central character. She’s a little (okay a lot) odd, a computer hacker genius, and really a genius in many ways. This story has Mikael and Lisbeth involved with hacking into NSA computer systems and trying to solve the murder of one of the originators of a grand computer scheme. It’s too complicated to explain here! Helping Lisbeth crack the computer system is a most unlikely source- an 11 year old boy, severely autistic, but extremely intelligent, who just happens to also not speak. But, he can draw intricate depictions of things he has seen and calculate insanely difficult mathematical problems with very little effort. It’s a fabulous book that kept me reading and wondering how Mikael, Lisbeth, and the boy were going to bring it all to the end!

  Okay, as I said, you have to read the first three books first, so here are links to those: