A Review of Rebellious Heart by Jody Hedlund

This is my second book by Jody Hedlund. Rebellious Heart was better than I expected. It’s definitely not one of the best books that I have ever read, but I did enjoy the story. Technically I give the book a 3.75, it’s better than a 3 ½ rating, but not really a 4.  This rating is due to the fact that the main character annoyed me at times. I want to start with what I did not enjoy about the book. I didn’t really care for the character Susanna. She was portrayed as being intellectual, but to me she came off naïve and a little annoying. I didn’t hate the character, some of the things she said and some of her actions annoyed me.  One thing I do not like in books is when the characters love each other, but they make up excuses why they can’t be with the other person and then they are sad by their choice. It makes me want to scream at the character to stop being so dumb and just date the guy. The other thing that annoyed me was that Susanna felt bad about something she said to Ben when she was only 5 years old and Ben was still offended by it. Really? She was 5, I don’t even remember anything I said when I was 5. It just made me roll my eyes. It would have been more realistic if she had said that to him when she was 16. Then I would understand why he was offended still and she was embarrassed by it. Ok, now on to what I enjoyed about the book. I really did like the other characters: Ben, Tom, and Phoebe. I also enjoyed the storyline about the runaway indentured servant because it was original. Overall I found the book entertaining. Although it wasn’t one of those books that kept me up all night, I still liked it. So far it’s my favorite book by Jody Hedlund.

I received this book for free from Bethany House Publishers for my honest review.

Review of Dragonwitch (Tales of Goldstone Wood, #5) by Anne Elisabeth Stengl

I was looking forward to reading this book because I enjoy fantasy novels. When I first started reading it I didn’t care for it. I found myself thinking things like “what just happened” “who is that” “this is weird.” At the same time the book was not boring, so it was easy for me to keep reading. The book has more than one storyline and it was hard to keep track of it at first. About half way through the book it started to make sense and I started to enjoy it. Because the book is based in a make believe world a lot of names and terms are made up, which also added to the difficulty in understanding what was happening in the book. The other complaint I have is that the story would constantly change whose point of view the book was from. Usually a book separates different character’s point of view by chapters. This book would say what one character was thinking and then the next page it was about someone else. It was annoying at first, but I got used to that as well. So, at first I thought I would give the book a 3 because some parts were confusing. By the time I was finished with it I decided to give it a 4. I found that I truly enjoyed the book. It always held my interest. I also enjoyed the fact that it was such a unique storyline and different from anything I have ever read. I liked the characters as well and I would read another book from the series. To anyone who wants to read this book I say don’t stop in the beginning because it does get better.

I received this book for free from Bethany House Publishers for my honest review