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The Price of Redeeming Love: A Modern Retelling of Ruth
The Price of Redeeming Love is a work of Christian fiction and contemporary biblical retelling that reimagines the Book of Ruth in a modern setting, moving the story into drought-stricken California and a farming community in Sonora, where loss, migration, loyalty, and costly love shape the lives of Grace, Lucía, and Bo Porter. The book begins in collapse and keeps one eye on grief even when it turns toward romance, which I appreciated. It is not shy about its roots either. Mike Cleveland openly frames the novel as a faithful modern Ruth retelling, with Grace standing in for Naomi, Lucía for Ruth, and Bo for Boaz, and that clear framework gives the whole story a steady backbone.
I found the protagonist compelling because she feels shaped by pressure rather than built as a symbol first. Grace, especially in the opening stretch, comes across as tired, doubtful, loving, and stubborn in a way that feels relatable. I liked that she isn’t presented as endlessly strong. She is grieving even before the worst losses arrive, and her faith is frayed, which gives her emotional weight and makes her growth feel earned. She carries the novel’s questions about loyalty, survival, and grace without ever seeming too neat, and that roughness is part of what made her believable to me.
What stayed with me most was how grounded the emotional world felt when the book was at its best. The early sections, especially the move from a dying farm into the strange abundance of Sonora, have real texture. I could feel the dust, the heat, the fatigue, and then that almost disorienting shock of green after so much loss. Author Mike Cleveland writes grief in a direct way. He doesn’t try to make it pretty.
I also found the author’s choices interesting because he is doing more than updating a Bible story. He’s translating its moral and spiritual shape into modern concerns like immigration status, farm labor, climate strain, and belonging. That gives the book a wider frame than a simple inspirational romance. Bo is clearly written as more than a love interest. He carries the kinsman-redeemer role very deliberately, and the novel makes its Christ-centered symbolism plain. That will certainly be moving for some readers. For me, the strength of the book is that it understands redemption as something material as well as spiritual. Food, shelter, paperwork, work, land, family, protection. Love here is not abstract. It has weight. It costs something. And that idea gives the story a sturdy, old-fashioned force.
By the end, I came away feeling that this is the kind of novel best read by people who don’t mind wearing their hearts a little closer to the surface. I would recommend The Price of Redeeming Love most to readers who enjoy Christian fiction, redemptive romance, and biblical retellings that stay openly tethered to scripture while still trying to live and breathe as contemporary fiction. Readers who want a story about grief slowly turning toward grace, and who want that story told with conviction, will probably find a lot to value here.
Pages: 395 | ASIN : B0GRCWP23X
Get Involved However You Can
Worth of a Girl centers around an eight-year-old girl from Uganda whose young life is altered forever when she is forced into a trafficking ring disguised as a trade school. Why did you choose to tell the story through eight-year-old Bibi’s perspective?
I chose a young girl’s point of view to show perspective. The innocence of a child who trusts adults to do right by them and to help, not hurt, them provides a stark contrast. It reveals truth versus the ugly evil of the world. A child tells the story much better than an adult.
How did you approach writing trauma in a way that is honest but not overwhelming or exploitative?
My books are about children and the evils they face, whether it addresses abandonment, exploitation, or abuse and loneliness. Because the plot is meant to be inspirational, I want to give the reader a sense of the trauma without actually telling it with explicit words. Grueling words, swearing, or foul language are not necessary if the author can show the action. One’s imagination can play a bigger role if the reader is told what to think. It’s been proven: ‘you’re more afraid of what you can’t see. ‘They’ll understand and see it, feel it, if it’s written honestly and plainly without a lot of detail.
The contrast between promise (school, clothing, opportunity) and reality (exploitation) is powerful. How did you develop that tension?
First, and foremost, I pray and ask God to help me write words that convey reality and tug on readers’ heartstrings. Then, I put myself in the main character’s head as much as possible. Although I’ve never faced these terrible conditions, I can imagine what it must feel like. I’m probably not even close. I do know, however, what failed promises feel like and the disappointment that follows. Extensive research (over three years) went into this book from interviews with African missionaries to documentaries and other reading. I learned what many girls had to do and endure to survive. Many of the incidents in the book were derived from real testimonies.
What kind of conversations do you hope this book starts among readers, churches, or communities?
The goal of this book is awareness of child exploitation. The awful plight of innocent children who are taken and abused, tortured, and sometimes killed needs to be known. It doesn’t just happen overseas. It’s close to home; it might even be happening down the block from where you live. Who would know? I hope readers will get a sense of urgency to help these children in some way, even if it’s through their church in helping children, fostering kids, or opening their hearts to volunteer. Not everyone can donate money. Many communities have groups that minister to children in some way. I sew dresses for girls overseas. It is known that if they have a new dress, especially with a label on it, it means they are being watched — thus, less likely to be taken by a predator. If I’ve helped just one girl in that way, my mission and goal have been fulfilled. I hope others get involved in any way possible.
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When Bibi faces challenges beyond her control, her bold, unshakable faith guides her with courage and strength. But how will she endure her fate? What will it take to save her?
When the new missions doctor, Dr. Steve Warden, arrives in Uganda, he suspects something nefarious is going on at the trade school. He never expected to unearth the dark underbelly of Evil directly beneath those who vowed to help the children. With righteous indignation ignited, he determines to seek justice for the children and rescue Bibi, even if it means taking down his own colleague and well-known people of the community.
The Bible of Blackwater County
What first struck me is how confidently The Bible of Blackwater County builds its world. From the opening pages, author Jenny Cafaro gives Blackwater County the weight of a lived-in place, not just a backdrop, with Bessie’s voice carrying gossip, pain, memory, and warning all at once. The setup is instantly compelling: an eighteen-year-old Bessie is being drawn into marriage with sixty-two-year-old Grady Richardson, and the novel makes that fact feel both personal and social, like one woman’s crisis and a whole community’s moral failure rolled into one. The Depression-era Appalachian setting feels gritty without turning into museum glass, which helps the book feel alive instead of dutiful.
The strongest thing here is the narration. Bessie doesn’t sound polished, and that’s exactly why she works. Her voice has texture, humor, anger, and a kind of hard-earned clarity that keeps the book from slipping into generic historical fiction. Even when the prose is dealing with cruelty, judgment, and the way a town can feed on scandal, it keeps its grip on the intimate human cost. There’s a line early on about truth being messy and bloody and not always making sense, and that idea seems to shape the whole novel. Cafaro is more interested in emotional truth than tidy storytelling, and the book is better for it.
The novel doesn’t beg the reader to admire its seriousness. It trusts the material. The dedication to Grandmaw Bessie and the framing as a story drawn from family history and a newspaper article could have pushed the book toward reverence, but instead, it feels urgent and personal. The result is a story that is raw without being shapeless. At the same time, that rawness may be a challenge for some readers. The trigger warning is there for a reason, and the book seems willing to sit in ugliness. Still, that choice feels honest to the world it’s portraying.
The Bible of Blackwater County is a memorable, voice-driven novel that succeeds because it feels told rather than manufactured. Its biggest strength is the sense that someone is finally saying the thing that was buried for too long. That gives the book a pulse that will stick with readers. It’s not always easy, and I would not call it subtle in the delicate literary sense, but it’s vivid, emotionally committed, and grounded in a strong sense of place. For readers who want historical fiction with bite, personality, and a narrator who feels like a real person, this book has a lot going for it.
Pages: 399 | ASIN : B0G5Z9KQ42
Adventure Into the Unknown
The 6th Heaven centers around a plastic surgeon whose life is turned upside down when mysterious tattoos begin to cover his body, and he sets out on a journey to the Amazon jungle to find the key to his curse. Where did the idea for this novel come from?
The idea for the novel grew naturally from the first two books in the 21 Tattoos Series. As Derek’s journey of self-discovery reaches both emotional highs and lows, he becomes increasingly driven to find answers—how the tattoos appeared, what they signify, and whether he can ever be free of them.
Did The 6th Heaven begin as a spiritual story, a psychological one, or an adventure into the unknown?
It started more as an adventure into the unknown. I didn’t know what would happen next to Derek until he made the decision to enter the jungle—then the story began to unfold on its own. As I continued writing, I realized that his struggle in the jungle mirrored the conflict within his own mind, and I expanded on that connection.
Where did you find the inspiration for Derek’s traits and dialogue?
It developed over time. I started writing about a man waking up with tattoos, and he just started to develop in my mind, and as I researched the meaning of tattoos I got to know him. Most of the material relates to experiences in my life.
Can we look forward to another installment in The 21 Tattoos Series soon? Where will it take readers?
My 4th book will be out in September 2026. Already with the publisher.
My 5th book will be out in September 2027. 50% finished.
My 6th and final book of The 21 Tattoos Series will be out in September 2028.
Each book follows Derek and Kendal as their relationship deepens, facing life’s challenges and evolving into the people they’re meant to become.
Author Links: GoodReads | X (Twitter) | Facebook | Website | Amazon
Derek Hollinger has walked a long, hard road since a fateful encounter with an Indigenous shaman woman turned his life upside down. Now married to Kendal, his angel and savior, Derek desperately wants to be the man she deserves. But his obsession with his tattoos-what they mean and how to get rid of them-is tearing down everything they’ve built together.
Paralyzed by depression and self-loathing, Derek is convinced that only one person can help him now: the granddaughter of the shaman whose power inked him from head to toe. Enlisting the aid of his loyal friend and spiritual advisor, Father Mike, Derek treks deep into the heart of the Amazon jungle, where a final reckoning between good and evil awaits.
But God’s plan for Derek isn’t what he expects. And coming back alive-whole in mind, heart, and spirit-will require every ounce of his fortitude and faith.
The 6th Heaven is Book 3 in The 21 Tattoos Series, by Monica Broussard. Read Book 1 (21 Tattoos) and Book 2 (The 7th Dimension) to jump into this saga filled with heart, passion, faith, and fear. Discover how Derek Hollinger’s journey for answers begins.
Worth of a Girl
Worth of a Girl is a faith-centered suspense novel that follows eight-year-old Bibi, a Ugandan girl who thinks she is being sent to school, only to be drawn into a trafficking operation disguised as a trade school. From there, the story becomes a survival narrative about deception, cruelty, rescue, and the long road back to dignity. It’s fiction, but the book makes clear that it is rooted in real patterns of child trafficking, and that real-world grounding gives the novel its weight.
I enjoyed how plainly C.A. Simonson tells this story. The writing is direct, accessible, and emotionally clear. There is no fancy distance between the reader and the pain here. We experience so much through Bibi’s innocence, and that choice gives the early chapters a hard kind of irony because I understood the danger long before she did. That made the book unsettling in an effective way. I also thought Simonson handled contrast well. The false promises of dresses, schooling, and food sit right beside the reality of exploitation, and that gap becomes the whole engine of the novel. The dialogue and character lines felt pointed at times, but in this case, I could see why. This is the kind of book that wants to tell a story and sound an alarm at the same time.
I found myself responding just as much to the author’s moral choices as to the plot. This is not a morally gray book. It is openly interested in evil, faith, protection, and restoration, and it leans fully into a Christian framework where prayer, providence, and courage shape the way forward. That will work well for some readers. For me, it mostly worked because the book’s strongest thread is not abstraction but worth itself, the insistence that children who are treated like property are still fully human, still precious, still deserving of safety and a future. I appreciated that the ending does not stop at rescue. It keeps moving toward rebuilding, education, work, community, and leadership, especially in Bibi’s later life, which gave the novel a sense of earned hope instead of quick relief.
I would recommend Worth of a Girl most strongly to readers of Christian fiction, issue-driven suspense, and redemptive drama, especially those who want a novel that is emotionally straightforward and grounded in a real social crisis. It’s not a subtle book, and I don’t think it wants to be. It wants to witness, to warn, and to restore some sense of hope. I respected that. Readers who want a heartfelt, faith-shaped novel about survival, rescue, and human dignity will likely find a lot to appreciate here.
Pages: 314 | ASIN : B0G6KNFMNB
Quiet Sacrifice
Family follows a grieving woman who stumbles upon a family secret when she attempts to trace threatening letters back to their mysterious sender. Where did the idea for this novel come from?
There is a very old, soft leather wallet from before the Civil War that has been handed down in my family. In it are letters. They outline one man’s attempt to hold on to our family’s good reputation when his brother‑in‑law and sister allegedly stole their father’s cash, leaving many debts. This was a family matter—no charges made in a court of law, but a conviction made in the court of public opinion. The man’s sister blamed him. The brother‑in‑law and sister left for Ohio.
The man stayed. He worked for years to pay off every one of those debts and avoid selling his father’s farm in a depressed market. When prices finally rebounded, he did sell it, then sent money to his brothers—and yes, to his sister.
That mixture of duty, hurt, and quiet sacrifice stayed with me. Family is my way of exploring what happens when secrets, loyalty, and public reputation collide in another time and place.
Were there any twists or revelations that changed during the writing process?
Yes. I’ve worked with this story for years, so there have been more changes than I can easily count. But that’s part of what I enjoy about writing. I originally drafted more than twenty books in this series just for my own pleasure, and now I’m editing them so I can share them with others. Each book goes through several iterations as the characters and their choices become clearer to me.
The revelation I enjoyed most in Family was the carriage scene where the older, married people are sharing their most embarrassing courting stories. Those moments arrived quite naturally on the page—and yes, both stories are drawn from my own experience. I laughed while I wrote them.
Faith is woven naturally into the characters’ lives rather than presented as a simple solution to problems. Why was that approach important to you?
I chose to write about 1619 London because faith was central to life then. For many people, it was simply the air they breathed. I wanted to give readers a chance to think about how people can live with faith in that kind of world—sometimes through short, sincere prayers in the moment, sometimes through wrestling with God rather than receiving quick, tidy answers.
My hope is to gently encourage readers who are inclined toward faith to consider weaving it into their ordinary days—not because I think they “should,” that’s between them and God, but because of the comfort and peace it often brings. I admire people who can quote chapter and verse. I can’t. And I don’t believe the insight and comfort I gain from a passage is always the same as what someone else might take from it. That’s part of the beauty for me.
On my website I offer a free 35‑page booklet titled Living With Faith… When You Feel… It looks at feelings many of us experience at one time or another—being overwhelmed, afraid of the future, and discouraged. It’s not a project or a checklist; it’s meant to be a quiet companion. You choose a verse that might speak to how you’re feeling and let it sit with you. No memorizing. No turning it into another task in an already busy life. Put it near your coffee maker or toothbrush, let your eyes land on it, and allow its meaning to stretch forward to greet you where you are on your journey.
That’s the kind of faith I wanted to reflect in Family: honest, present, sometimes questioning, always entwined with real life.
What is the next book you are working on? When can readers expect to see it released?
Thankless Child, book three in the On The Wings Of Angels series, is set in 1619 London. Elizabeth Bowmar’s life is shattered when she tries to help an old friend. Forced into an uneasy alliance, she must unravel a conspiracy of greed and betrayal to save herself and expose the corruption strangling the city.
Thankless Child is currently in edit and will be released in a few months. I’m excited to bring readers back into Elizabeth’s world as she faces new dangers and deeper questions of justice, loyalty, and faith.
Author Links: GoodReads | X (Twitter) | Website | Amazon
Amidst the shadows of 1619 London, Elizabeth Bowmar, a young midwife devoted to helping others, confronts an unseen menace that strikes at the heart of her own household. Whispers in darkened doorways, missing letters, and subtle threats all point to a danger that knows her routines, her loyalties, and her weaknesses far too well.
As conspiracy and fear tighten around her family, Elizabeth must trace the threat back to its source before it destroys the people she loves—and the hard‑won future she is only beginning to claim. Her world may be 1619, with cobbled streets and dim candlelight, but her fight for independence and the right to choose her own path is timeless.
When every choice seems to carry a cost, Elizabeth must decide whom to trust, how fiercely to protect her family, and how far faith can carry her when those closest to her may be hiding the deepest secrets.
Set against a richly drawn London on the brink of upheaval, Family weaves together mystery, faith, and love as Elizabeth uncovers a plot that could shatter more than her home. Step into a world where history unfolds, faith prevails, and love stirs in this gripping Christian historical mystery, Book Two of the On the Wings of Angels series.
Family will appeal to readers who enjoy the rich historical atmosphere and slow‑building romance of Julie Klassen and the faith‑forward intrigue of Roseanna M. White.
The 6th Heaven
The 6th Heaven by Monica Broussard follows Dr. Derek Hollinger, a plastic surgeon whose life is derailed when intricate tattoos suddenly appear all over his body. Struggling with depression and a past full of trauma, he leaves his wife, Kendal, and their Los Angeles home to trek into the Amazon jungle. He travels with a priest named Father Mike to find a shaman’s granddaughter who might hold the key to his curse. The journey is brutal. Derek faces venomous spiders and near-death experiences while Father Mike battles a jaguar. Eventually, through a mix of tribal rituals and a spiritual encounter with God, Derek undergoes a deep internal transformation that forces him to face his past and find true emotional freedom.
The writing feels deliberate and vivid. I like how the author uses the jungle as a mirror for Derek’s own mind. The descriptions of the rainforest are dense and humid. You can almost feel the dampness and the sting of the mosquitoes on every page. One of the author’s boldest choices is shifting the perspective between Derek’s physical struggle in the mud and Kendal’s emotional isolation back in California. It creates a tension that keeps you moving. I found myself curious about the tattoos and what they really meant. The way the ink is treated as both a physical burden and a spiritual map is a fascinating concept. The pacing is patient. It takes its time to let the characters sit with their thoughts, which makes the action scenes, like the jaguar attack, feel sudden and earned.
I spent a lot of time thinking about the ideas of identity and healing in this story. Derek is a man who builds physical beauty for a living, yet he feels hideous because of something he can’t control. The book explores the gap between how the world sees us and how we see ourselves. I liked the candid look at trauma. It doesn’t offer easy fixes. Even after the spiritual revelations, the characters still carry physical and emotional scars. The intersection of Christian faith and Indigenous shamanic traditions is an interesting choice. It makes for a unique spiritual landscape. It made me wonder about the nature of mercy and whether we can ever truly outrun our past. The idea that our life story is written on our skin is a heavy one, but it feels grounded here.
This is a stirring Christian fiction novel that uses magical realism elements in an interesting way, along with some supernatural elements. It’s a reflective story about redemption and the hard work of coming home to yourself. I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys stories about spiritual journeys or readers who like fiction that wrestles with deep psychological themes. It’s a solid choice for someone looking for a grounded adventure that is not afraid to get a little bit dark before finding the light.
Pages: 265 | ASIN : B0FHBZWMRS
Family: A Christian Historical Mystery
Family, by KT McWilliams, is a historical fiction novel with a strong thread of faith and a steady mystery engine. It follows Elizabeth Bowmar in London in 1619 as she grieves her father’s murder, chafes under the strict protection and reputation-guarding rules of her guardian Edmund, and gets pulled into a growing danger around threatening “pay” letters and a missing sender. As Elizabeth and a small circle of allies try to trace the threats, the investigation cracks open something bigger than street crime: a family secret that reshapes how she understands loyalty, love, and the people she thought she knew.
Elizabeth’s inner life is intense in a way that feels earned. She’s smart, bruised, devout, and stubborn, and she finds herself in situations where those traits clash. Sometimes that clash is almost funny, like when “basic kindness” turns into a social catastrophe because London is watching and Edmund is keeping score. Other times it’s heavier, especially when her fear of losing Edmund starts echoing her earlier loss, and you can feel her trying to think her way out of panic. I also appreciated how the faith element is woven in as a lived posture. “God’s plan” shows up as something characters wrestle with, not something that magically fixes the plot.
McWilliams makes some clear authorial choices that shape the reading experience. One is the emphasis on “family” as a moral problem, not just a warm theme. The betrayal isn’t treated like a twist for shock value. It lands like a winter draft through a room you thought was sealed, and the aftermath is where the book does its real work: the stunned bargaining, the anger, the exhausted attempt to keep living anyway. Another choice is how plot and relationships braid together. The mystery around the letters and the contract pressure keep things moving, while the social world pushes Elizabeth toward decisions she does not want to make. I’ll be candid, the prose occasionally leans hard into explanation or repeated reminders of the social rules. But it also delivers small, tactile moments that ground the story, and the dialogue-driven scenes tend to snap into focus fast.
I’d recommend Family most to readers who like historical fiction that feels emotional and values-driven, with clean romance energy and a mystery plot that is more about people than puzzles. If you enjoy stories where characters grow through pressure, especially pressure framed through faith and conscience, you’ll probably settle into this one quickly. If you want a reflective, story-first read about what we owe our families, what they owe us, and what happens when the truth finally gets daylight, you’ll enjoy this book.
Pages: 305 | ASIN : B0GKYJB57Q
