Compelling Story but Unbelievable in Parts
341279
Having read a little about the book, I knew that "Grace" was not going to be a regular Evans story. I have really enjoyed his other books. They are sweet and uplifting and soothing to the soul. "Grace" is not really that kind of book. The characters are charming but not always believable. Being the mother of nine grown children and a middle grades teacher, I kept thinking that none of my children or students would have reacted like these children acted. Moreover,  I kept asking myself why all the adults in their lives were so thick. That aside, the story is a powerful one and the emotional scene at the end made me cry. Children do think convoluted things sometimes. Stories about abuse need to be told, and the characters are sweet and charming if not very real. Prepare for a compelling read and a good cry.
1378533
I did enjoy this book, found it to be a compelling story, but had several frustrations:

 The first chapter was overwritten, but it leveled out with some great prose thereafter.
 How old was the feral girl?  Didnt find out for many chapters.
 What era was it? Didnt find out until some technology was used several chapters in (it felt like the 20s or 30s and felt that way all the way through. Thats partly my own sheltered upbringing; hard to believe people live like that today).
 What ethnicity were the main characters? Black, white, something else? Never could tell.
 Some actions were so over-the-top it was crazy and seemed out of character.

Despite these issues, I was drawn through the story. I do feel a historical setting would have made some of the confusion go away. Im guessing the concern was that human trafficking is a problem now, but it was also a problem back then, just not as publicized.

Dont get me wrong; this was professionally written, it just needed an equally professional editor to catch these issues.
3438654
The storyline is fascinating and invites thought and sympathy but I was left wanting (and maybe even a little disappointed) at the end. A large portion of the book seemed to be text and Skype convo
1654795
Ireland of 1755 was ravaged by famine and a way of life was further destroyed by the brutal occupation of the British. For Darcy and her brother, Liam McBride, life in Kerry was hand-to-mouth; their family died during the Great Frost and Hunger of 1740. But they were survivors. When villagers were caught smuggling French brandy traded for wool, the men were hanged, Darcy was put on a conscription ship and sold in sexual servitude to a British officer in the colonies.

The first part of the story depicts how Irish Catholics had to fight to practice their religion, and to survive. Amanda got this part right: "the British had imposed severe constraints on every facet of a Catholic's life. No Catholic could vote, buy land or worship openly." And "the British paid paltry sums for the Irishman's wool. The government allowed the Irish to trade with no other country but Great Britain..."

The second half of the story describes how Irish Catholic peasants, divested of their homes, and land, were conscripted into servitude by the British. Being an indentured servant in the New World, meant one was a slave, with no rights. But Darcy makes it a brave new world with her fortitude and will to survive even though Massachusetts was still the frontier and the British-French Indian wars were in full swing.

This is a story of belief and determination where faith in God motivates and informs the characters, but it's not a "Christian" love story. The strong protagonist is passionate and courageous. However, i got rather tired of hearing about Darcy's amazing green eyes. it has some poorly written dialogue, there are missing words, punctuation, paragraphs, and pages. It's not evenly paced.

One reader commented that Amanda Hughes draws a historically-challenged timeline of Famine Ireland and pre-revolutionary America. Another reader put it: "The transition to the New World was interesting, but somewhat unauthenticly staged."

I wonder if some of the confusion lies in the fact that several readers erroneously assumed that the famine Amanda Hughes refers to--was the Great Famine, An Gorta Mr of 1845. But she's actually referring to an earlier famine. The Irish Famine of 1740-1741 was called Bliain an ir, the Year of the Slaughter, (caused by extreme weather and poor harvests), not the Great Hunger (caused by a potato blight). By 1755, there was little by way of food. I quibble: "the repressive system" didn't cause the failure of crops--the weather did; coal was scarce and peat was the only source of heat. It was also called the year of no summer.

I had some trouble getting past the introduction: the author informs us that the heroine's name, Darcy, meaning 'dark' i(from the Gaelic). Dubh is dark in Irish. No way to get Darcy from that. D'arcy (the archer) is an Irish surname from Strongbow's Norman invasion, not a girl's first name. There are other anachronisms, many threads and storylines.

An ambitious amazing debut novel with engaging characters. An epic adventure, it is not light reading or a fluffy romance. The author bit off more than she could chew. As another reader wrote: "the author broke every writing rule simply because she clearly did not know them." The story would have better served if it were split it into two books.
832724
I liked the story and the mystery was fairly decent, but they give away too much information in the product description and the book jacket.
That information covers more than the first fourth of the book!
I would rather have found out about the murder on my own (by reading the story) instead of reading about it on the back of the book before I
had even started.

It is interesting how Darko manages with so few resources, he has to provide his own vehicle and often works odd hours.
The interplay between the murder victim, her husband, and her inlaws at the beginning of the book was quite compelling.

The friction between Darko, an atheist, and his religious wife that crops up during the murder investigation seemed very
realistic.

I was rather disappointed by the very end of the story, but I can't say more than that without getting into spoilers.

Recommended
3182788
Being the mother of two sons, I was completely drawn to this story, given how the protagonist' own mother's violent and sudden death causes his life to spiral out of control for several years. The characters seemed three dimensional and the dialogue believable. However, I found the end of the book to be long winded and preachy. The author had already shown us how the protagonist had evolved. No need to tell us too with platitudes about the meaning of truth, love, etc. Nevertheless, other parts of the book are so beautifully written and compelling, I forgive her.
1485693
I enjoy stories whose authors take an historical figure about whom little is known, and try to fill in the blanks with talent, imagination, and solid research. This is such a story. The positives about it are the author's research, which seems solid, and her attempt to make the characters come alive on the page. The main negative was that the black evil and debauchery of the "bad guys" was so extreme that it left a kind of two-dimensional, almost flat ,impression.  That flatness may have been inevitable because the story was told in the first person. The protagonist herself was pretty believable because we were able to get "inside her head," to know her thoughts and emotions. Having said that, however, a couple of things did bother me. The first was the emphasis on the queen's virginity. The story makes much of showing the Sanhedrin the bloody sheets of the marriage bed to prove that the queen was a virgin. But this was he second marriage. She was supposed to have been in an unconsummated  marriage for several years before her first husband was killed. Why hadn't the Sanhedrin insisted on similar  proof from the wedding night with that first husband?  My second criticism is that the queen lived in a palace, yet we read very little hint of palace gossip or palace intrigue.  For example, couldn't palace gossips inform the queen--or sympathetic members of the Sanhedrin--about a plot to kill the first king? Wouldn't palace servants loyal to a popular queen keep t here informed of her second husband's secret activities or the Sanhedrin's plots? She certainly saw some of the  open defiance if one of her goals was to keep peace in Jerusalem, she would have used he servants to advantage. Such details would have fleshed out the story, made it more credible.  But regardless, the story is a good one, and a decent addition to the literature.
1940258
3 1/2 Stars

If you can get past the unbelievable aspects and sink into the fiction, this book will grab you and keep your interest until the VERY unsatisfactory ending!  It wasn't hard to figure out the killer early on, but the red herrings will keep some guessing.  My biggest complaint is the fact that this is NOT a stand alone novel.  It ends abruptly and the story continues in book 2.  I always feel duped when that happens.  Just know that you need to read both books to finish the story.  Thank you to Thomas & Mercer and NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
437868
An extraordinary story! A pity that the exaggerated level of detail makes it difficult to read many of the chapters.
40486
I looked forward to reading this book after hearing an interview with the author on the radio. I expected a bit more from it and yet, it
certainly kept me reading it to the end. The story was compelling and told well. I did think the author went a bit overboard in talking
about some of the excessives of the main character. Although the story was set some decades ago, even then most police officers knew
about due process. Making the character claim to be oblivious to this, was to me where the book fell short of my expectations.
611919
Story keeps your attention and the pages turning, but the feats performed by main character are a bit unrealistic and timeliness too convenient.
3377009
Potential spoilers here!

Despite the flaws listed, I found The Reform Artists very compelling and could not put it down. The author shows impressive knowledge of legal procedures and the head-games often involved in civil litigation. The reasons why I cannot, alas, give it more than three stars are:

1. The ending's a bit too easy for my tastes. After being locked into the tension of the earlier chapters, I expected something a little less squeaky-clean and happily-ever-after for the protagonist.

2. While the majority of the novel is quite focused, certain passages are disconnected fromi.e., the prologueor completely irrelevant toi.e., all of Chapter 20--the rest of the story. Certain characters are introduced, presumably to play an active role in the story. . .but many of them dont. It seems that more and more publishers these days could care less about working with their authors in the area of practical editing. As long as a book sells, who cares, right?

3. Though its understood to be a secret and shadowy organization that apparently has wholly altruistic interests in leveling the playing field for individuals faced with assaults on their liberties, the organization that comes to Marty Silkwoods aid is less than believable, the stuff of fantasy in a novel that attempts to be realistic. I also found it hard to believe that a thick-skinned CPA like Marty would be so immediately willing to accept the existence of such an organization, much less trust its intentions. The "reform artists" seem too good to be true, and they are.

4. Marty and Katy--particularly the latter--do not seem exactly real. Some backstory on their past life together would have helped. Also, the fact that the parents of two young children will remain completely estranged from one another is not given the weight it would have in real life.

5. There is some very convincing dialogue, but a lot of the narrative is flat, without much spontaneity. Much is needlessly and clinically over-explained; ex: He was glad they could enjoy this activity together (Chapter 31).

6. The whole problem of false allegations of spousal abuse is presented as being entirely due to cheating, conniving, unstable wives. While there is some acknowledgment that some and probably most such allegations are true, this aspect may prove very alienating for many female readers. Another point: Though its less common, men have also been known to seek restraining orders against estranged wives (sometimes for exaggerated or entirely bogus reasons).

Oh, well. As a thriller intended solely for light entertainment, this book succeeds pretty well. Those looking for anything deeper or more convincing, however, will probably be disappointed.
1073974
Molly and her husband want to adopt a child, but Molly is worried that the adoption agency and her spouse may discover her lies and secrets that include her mother supposedly having murdered her father. The story is told in chapters alternating between the present and the past.  In the past chapters we find out what happened to Molly as a teenager that distanced her from almost everyone she was once close to.  The book has some decent if superficial characterizations, moves quickly and has interesting facts about open adoption, teenagers, and the ravages of a bad form of multiple sclerosis.  The movement of the story was dragged down a little by some narrative that didn't add to the plot or the characters.  The biggest problem, though, was that the ending did not explain why Molly would be so angry at her family for 24 years. When I found out what really happened (and much of it is obvious way before the end) I could not accept that Molly's alienation was believable and not preventable.  This made a major part of the plot seem to be no more than a trick.
2454186
I struggled a bit with how many stars to give this book, because on the one hand, it was a compelling read, and especially in the second half I could not put it down because I really wanted to see how it was going to unfold. I also really loved certain spiritual teachings and aspects of the book, and the descriptions of places, which evoked the stark desert setting very well. However, there were some aspects of the writing and the tone that bothered me, and so I couldn't quite give it a 5-star rating.

This is a retelling of Jesus' life and teachings, including many of the most well-known stories from the New Testament. I was surprised to see some reviewers saying this isn't the case, because with the use of A.D. dating on the chapters, and events from the New Testament corresponding to these dates, it's hard to read it any other way. Several contemporary novels, from&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/The-Da-Vinci-Code/dp/0307474275/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">The Da Vinci Code</a>&nbsp;to Chopra's&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/Jesus-A-Story-of-Enlightenment/dp/B0041T4NZY/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">Jesus: A Story of Enlightenment</a>, have attempted to reimagine Jesus' life, but this is by far the most creative and radical of those I have read. I don't want to give everything away (although some reviewers have done so), so will keep this rather vague, but basically, Jesus' teachings are presented here as nature-based, and based on feminine spirituality teachings revolving around the life-giving force of the 'Great Mother.' 'The Way' bears a lot of similarity to feminine nature-based spirituality as presented by writers and teachers such as Riane Eisler in her classic&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/The-Chalice-and-the-Blade-Our-History-Our-Future/dp/0062502891/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future</a>&nbsp;and Merlin Stone in her&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/When-God-Was-a-Woman/dp/015696158X/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">When God Was a Woman</a>&nbsp;(both mentioned by the author in her acknowledgements.)

As I mentioned, the story pulled me along, mostly because I really wanted to see how it was going to dovetail with the conventional versions of Jesus' life. I also felt the writing evoked the stark desert setting well. However, I found most of the characters very one-dimensional. They each seemed to represent a certain trait or plot point, and didn't have a lot of depth beyond that. I was particularly bothered by the portrayal of men in this book, all of whom are monstrously violent, damaged, or both. The only exception, Solomon, who serves as a male guardian of 'the way', disappears in the second half of the book.

This one-dimensional portrayal of men, and the fact that philosophically in the book this is tied to the representation of God as male and vengeful, while the Great Mother wholly represents wisdom and compassion, sets up a spiritual polemic that bothered me. It came across as God as Father=male violence vs. Goddess as Mother=female compassion, and that was a little too simple a representation for me. I kept hoping for some kind of balance to emerge - a positive male character, or a philosophical appreciation for both mother and father, male and female, but it never happened. So I felt the book was very polemical, and honestly even outdated, as I view that kind of thinking as the first wave of women's spirituality, and it has evolved since then.

However, I feel this book is absolutely worth a read, because it is so different and thought-provoking. So please, read it yourself and make up your own mind!
3489407
I struggled with how to rate this book. I really enjoyed reading it--I wanted to keep reading, and never considered stopping. The concept of time travel (won't spoil it by giving details) was fascinating and different than anything else I've read in that genre.

However, a couple of things really bothered me. Characters didn't seem realistic. One of the main characters experiences a tremendous loss early in the book, and it hardly seems to affect her. Every few chapters, the character seems to remember the loss and briefly get sad before moving on. It doesn't makes sense for it to be shock, as this character is just acting way too normal. Another character fits that old novel stereotype of "ex-Special Forces dude who can do practically anything."

The second annoyance was the long periods of exposition, especially when explaining time travel. There's got to be a way to get through the explanations faster, and get back to the action.

The story is very compelling, and because of that, I enjoyed the novel a lot. The writing, however, lacks depth and realism.
2820333
Don't get me wrong; this is a really good book, but there's too many totally impossible and unrealistic things taking place.  I like the lead character, Lucy, the FBI agent.  She's real, as are all the characters, and they're richly described and fleshed out.

My problem is that the author "assumes" our knowledge of all the government acronyms currently in use, and more often than not, doesn't actually tell us what some of these things mean.  That's not the worst of it; I did find it truly impossible to imagine that everything taking place occurs over one single weekend, especially when our lead character has a 6" piece of metal imbedded in her back, and blithely has it removed with no anesthesia, dresses, leaves the emergency room and actually goes back to work.  Really?  I'm thinking NOT!

Then there's the light bulb that comes on over her head (literally) all of a sudden, and she knows who the "bad guy" is, without the reader ever having gleaned any kind of clue as to how it could be that person (no spoiler!). The storyline is excellent, thought out well, described in vivid detail so that you're "seeing" these things and getting into the story.  There are a great many formatting/spelling/grammatical errors, which in my world, takes away from a book's rating, because I feel the author, or their representative, should have done a much better job of proofing.  You can't have characters changing names, then going back to the original, correct name, and that happens in this book.

The story is worth reading, and it does grab your attention and keeps you entertained.  Just be aware going into it, that there are some highly improbable (if not impossible) scenarios that take place, and that the formatting lacks quite a bit.  It's well worth your reading time, and I'd probably read additional books by this author.  Thank you.
1061996
Archer is a superb storyteller but there are elements of this novel that simply deny credibility.  While the characters are very well developed, their behaviors are too often predictable.