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What happens when a husband’s dying wish is for his wife to find a new love . . . before he’s even gone?
IN EVERY LIFE
In Every Life by Rea Frey
Harper is living a life she never expected. After a failed attempt at making it as an artist in New York while falling for and losing her first love, her dreams crumbled in the span of a week. A decade later, Harper is happily living a simpler life as an art teacher in Chattanooga with her beloved new husband, Ben.
When Ben is diagnosed with late-stage cancer, their whole world shifts. Despite the bad news, Ben comes up with one final wish for his wife: he wants Harper to find a new partner before he dies. When the New York Times sends a journalist to do a feature story about Ben’s life, Harper comes face to face with Liam Hale, the man she fell madly in love with all those years ago and never saw again.
Suddenly, Harper is faced with all of those old what-ifs:
What if Harper had ended up with Liam instead of Ben?
What if she’d pursued life as an artist instead of teaching?
What if it had all turned out differently?
After making a wish, Harper wakes up to find herself in a parallel universe . . . where her what-ifs become a reality.
Is the grass really greener, or is she standing right where she should be–no matter the cost?
- Contemporary women’s fiction
- Stand-alone novel
- Book length: 93,000 words
- Includes discussion questions for book clubs
Purchase Links
Haper Muse | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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The expectations we feel from others today can make us feel that we are not enough. That we should want more, do more, and be more.
SHINE BRIGHT ANYWAY
Shine Bright Anyway: 90 Affirmations that Declare You Are Enough When the World Says You’re Not by Faith Broussard Cade
After a car accident in 2018 that left her with a traumatic brain injury that she still deals with today, author Faith Broussard Cade was in a place of trauma and brokenness. To this day, it hurts, it slows her down, and some days it leaves her feeling emotionally vulnerable and overwhelmed.
But despite this suffering every day she chooses gratitude, love, and hard work. Faith’s hand-penned notes sharing about her struggles on her Instagram account, @fleurdelisspeaks, has helped thousands of others do the same. And in this beautiful, full-color book she pairs each handwritten note with a longer message of encouragement to help you or someone you care about:
- Overcome the wounds of the past through honesty and humbleness
- Replace feelings of inadequacy with the truth of your worthiness
- Prioritize self-care even when life is demanding
- Celebrate each day with gratitude and appreciation
- Believe in yourself when others say you can’t or that you don’t matter
If life has left you feeling you are not enough or you are haunted by past choices, circumstances, or labels, Shine Bright Anyway will give you the encouragement to change your narrative. The expectations you live with today do not have to define you. You are enough!
Purchase Links
Harper Celebrate | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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Change your relationship with technology. Change your life.
RECONNECTED
Reconnected: How 7 Screen-Free Weeks with Monks and Amish Farmers Helped Me Recover the Lost Art of Being Human by Carlos Whittaker
Share. Post. Reply…Most of us have gotten so used to notifications and alerts, pings and rings, that even if we don’t want to be on our phones so much, we don’t know what to do about it. The constant flow of information affects our brains, relationships, and emotional well-being. We feel stuck, overwhelmed, overstimulated, and we want a way out.
Like many of us, podcaster and author Carlos Whittaker had lived for years in an always-on, always-connected world—and he felt more disconnected than ever from God, his community, and even himself. When Carlos Whittaker realized how many hours he was on his phone, he took extreme measures to see how unplugging could change his body and soul.
In Reconnected, Carlos shares the challenges, surprises, and profound insights of his self-imposed exile from technology, spending nearly two months screen-free at a monastery, an Amish farm, and at home. As you journey with Carlos through this life-changing experiment you will discover:
- how to retrain yourself to notice the world before you notice your texts;
- what technology does to your brain and what you can do about it;
- ways to prioritize in-person relationships even if you need screens for work or school;
- why turning down your phone’s volume turns up God’s voice in your life;
- the newfound joy of being bored, getting lost, and not having to Google every question that comes to your mind.
Blending wisdom from the past, practices of intentionality and community, and Whittaker’s signature engaging communication style, Reconnected will inspire and equip you to reset your life in a tech-saturated world. It’s time to take back control of your life from technology and recover the lost art of being human. You were made for more. This is how you start living again.
Purchase Links
Thomas Nelson | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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One lucky book club will win 2 sets of the following four classic titles in THE GOTHIC CHRONICLES series!
THE GOTHIC CHRONICLES
These spine-chilling classic novels are now available in a very special edition, featuring gold foil-accented hardcovers, stained page edges, ribbon markers, and distinctive decorative interior pages. Great for holiday gifts, as well as the perfect companion while traveling, this is a 4-volume horror collection including Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Dante’s Inferno, Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, and Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven and Other Selected Works.
Books can be purchased individually or as a collection.
Purchase Link
Harper Muse Classics
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A haunting memoir of childhood trauma, building a life, and living with wounds that never heal.
THE END OF TENNESSEE
The End of Tennessee by Rachel M. Hanson
“Not a year before I ran away from home at seventeen, I stepped out of the house at dusk, still able to see shrub oaks thinned out for winter, fame flower, too, and dun clay so wet the smell of it seemed settled in my skin.” So begins Rachel M. Hanson’s debut memoir about growing up impoverished, uneducated, and surrounded by violence. In lyrical, fragmented prose, she lays bare the impossible choice between self-preservation and her love for five younger siblings for whom she had become a second mother. As the years pass, Hanson struggles with guilt for leaving her siblings as she slowly realizes she could not save them. The End of Tennessee is a testament to a sister’s love, resilience, and determination, a book for anyone who has left one life to create another.
Purchase Links
The University of South Carolina Press | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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Embrace—and share—the transformative power of kindness through stories of more than one hundred GOOD PEOPLE, brought to you by Upworthy, the beloved social media platform where millions find inspiration, joy, and daily affirmation.
Upworthy – Good People: Stories From the Best of Humanity by Gabriel Reilich and Lucia Knell
GOOD PEOPLE is a much-needed trove of life-affirming stories told straight from the heart. Handpicked from Upworthy’s community of millions, each piece speaks to the breadth, depth, and beauty of the human experience. With proof that decency surrounds each and every one of us, Upworthy’s first book is a perspective-changing salve that will leave even the most unlikely reader feeling better about the world.
Rippling with wit, compassion, and courage, each chapter offers a restorative opportunity to believe in people’s fundamental goodness. Inside, you’ll find beautifully illustrated stories, including:
- The Kindest of Strangers, when a waitress’s regular customer gives her the opportunity to chart a new life course.
- Learn by Heart, when a teacher’s brilliance helps her class accept a little boy with an eye patch.
- It’s the Little Things, when a former baker finds a creative, and tasty, way to rally his community through the most difficult of times.
- The Kids Are All Right, when a lonely woman and a four-year-old girl bond over some unexpected fairytale magic.
- When I Needed It Most, when a landlord’s generosity helps his tenant navigate his grief.
- Away From Home, when a toddler and her mother provide safe haven for a sick fellow traveler.
An essential counterbalance to today’s daunting news cycle, this deeply moving book is emotional nourishment for navigating modern life, both online and off.
Purchase Links
Disney | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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On an isolated estate in late-eighteenth-century rural Wales, a young English doctor uncovers dangerous secrets that may threaten his own life in this spellbinding Gothic tale from the bestselling author of Pandora.
THE SHADOW KEY
The Shadow Key by Susan Stokes-Chapman
Dismissed from his post at a prestigious London hospital, Dr. Henry Talbot has little choice but to accept a mysterious offer of employment as a private physician from an inscrutable lord in rural Wales, Lord Julian. Arriving at Plas Helyg, the isolated estate, Henry can’t speak the language and finds himself treated with hostile suspicion by superstitious villagers, whose beliefs in myths and magic he’s inclined to dismiss. But when he discovers that his predecessor died under peculiar, inexplicable circumstances, his determination to uncover the truth leads him down a path fraught with danger—made all the more perilous by his headstrong, reluctant ally Linette, Lord Julian’s cousin.
Linette has lived a lonely life as Plas Helyg’s unconventional mistress: Julian treats her with disdain, her father is long dead, and her mother, long plagued by strange spells and believed by everyone around her to be deeply unwell, spends most of her time locked away in her rooms. Fiercely self-reliant, Linette refuses to wear women’s clothes, has no interest in marriage, and takes an interest in the welfare of the men working in Lord Julian’s mines, against his wishes.
Linette has always suspected something is not quite right in the village, but it is only through Henry’s dogged investigations that the dark truth about those closest to her will come to light—a truth that will bind hers and Henry’s destinies together forever in ways neither thought possible.
Purchase Links
HarperCollins | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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Please fill out our super short registration form (click the “Enter Now” button above) by September 30th for a chance to win a set of up to ten copies of one of these great books for your book club! We will randomly choose a winner at the end of the month. This giveaway is open to clubs in the US only (our apologies to friends in other countries).