The Shadowed Mind by Julie Cave

Wow! Another great book by Julie Cave! The Shadowed Mind is the second book in the Dinah Harris series. Dinah is still struggling with living out her newfound faith and staying sober when she is recruited as a consultant for the police department on a new case. Will she be able to juggle the demands of work and stay sober?

Julie does a great job of continuing to develop the characters she introduced in the first novel in the series. The characters are much more deep than those in many fiction books. I appreciated that Dinah is not the perfect character. She still struggles and fails and messes up and has to deal with guilt, shame, and the weight of her sin. She reminds me a lot of me ... with a different set of problems. I loved her new partner as well. He had his own set of problems, and I loved the interaction between them.

The ethical discussion in this book centered around euthanasia, assisted suicide, and true equality of all humans. The author talked a lot about eugenics, which I had never heard of before, but was really interesting to learn about. I didn't feel like this book was as "preachy" as the last one, but I did learn a lot about the topic.

I would definitely recommend this series and am looking forward to the third book which will be released this summer!

5 stars (out of 5)

I received a free copy of this book from New Leaf Publishers in exchange for my fair and honest review.

Deadly Disclosures by Julie Cave

Dinah Harris is an FBI agent struggling with alcoholism, depression, and dealing with her past. Recently put on administrative duty for messing up a case, she is asked to come back to full duty to invesitage the disappearance of Thomas Whitfield, the Secretary of the Smithsonian. Once Whitfield's body is found, the media coverage kicks up a notch, and Dinah is back in the media spotlight. Will she be able to set aside her personal problems long enough to solve this case? Or will she disgrace the FBI again?

A huge fan of mystery/suspense novels, I loved Deadly Disclosures by Julie Cave! The author portrays the main character differently than most heroines in Christian fiction, which often come off a little too perfect for my taste. Dinah is a realistic character with numerous problems.

The creation / evolution debate is at the center of this book. I found it interesting as I didn't know many of the specific details of this topic. The topic was explained in a way that was part of the story and not overly preachy. I did find it a little hard to believe that someone would be murdered over wanting to highlight creation as a plausible explanation of how the world was created. Perhaps I'm being naive, though.

I also liked the way everyday events and conversations with friends opened Dinah's mind to who God is. She really struggled with faith and understanding why all the Christians around her believed.

The story moved pretty quickly and there were several twists and turns that kept me hanging on to the very end. I look forward to reading the next book in the series, The Shadowed Mind.

4 stars (out of 5)

I received a free copy of this book from New Leaf Publishers in exchange for my fair and honest review.

Charlie and Trike in the Grand Canyon Adventure by Ken Ham with Karen Hansel

Charlie and Trike in the Grand Canyon Adventure was both educational and entertaining. Charlie (a monkey) and Trike (a dinosaur) have a great adventure at the Grand Canyon. They learn about fossils, Noah and the Flood, the canyon, and most importantly the truth of God's Word.

Kids will love to read this book because there are so many fun "extras." Each page has a cute little feature - a small book glued to it, a flap that reveals another page, a fold out, a map, etc. I appreciated how the author wove together the story about Noah and facts about the Grand Canyon. Both educational and biblical! At times the actual story bounced around a little. I would have liked a little more continuity. Overall, though, this was a great read and one that will stay in my "keep" pile.

4 stars (out of 5)

I received a free copy of this book from New Leaf Publishers in exchange for my fair and honest review.