Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Hake, Mills, Raney & Livingstons' Missouri Memories ~ Interviewed


Missouri Memories: Finishing Touches/ Beyond the Memories/Finally Home/The Pretend Family
By Kelly Eileen Hake, DiAnn Mills, Deborah Raney & Joyce Livingston,
Published by Barbour Publishing
ISBN 978-1-59789-595-8

Description:
If walls could talk ... what stories of faith and romance would the House on Cranberry Hill tell?

Finishing Touches: Captain Gregory Alan Royce has amassed a small fortune in 1898 to build his bride a spectacular home overlooking the Mississippi River at Hannibal, Missouri. But when his intended elopes with another, will there ever be a bride to grace the halls of the captain’s home?

Beyond the Memories: The house on Cranberry Hill was a gift from Maime Bradford’s husband, but since he was lost in The Great War and the depression hit, Maime opened the house to people in need. Could she possibly lose her heart to one new resident who reminds her so much of her late husband?

Finally Home: After the Vietnam War, Brian Lowe returns home to the family mansion in a wheelchair, only to be assigned to a physical therapist who is an outspoken war protestor. Can he find common ground with Kathy Nowlin?

The Pretend Family: Tadd Winsted has turned the grand house into a restaurant and spun a complicated tale that has his German parents believing he has gotten married. When Tadd hires Sabrena Stewart and her daughter to pose as his family, how far will the ruse go before someone learns the true meaning of love?

Review:
I’m a romantic. When I see a grand old home, I stop to daydream about who lived there and what their lives were like. This collection of novellas did just that. The common thread is the house and what happened therein. I loved how the stories followed one another in a different time period with altogether different characters from unrelated families.

Each novella was well-written with characters I cared about. Often in a collection like this, one story stands out above the others. Not so in this collection. I enjoyed each one as well as the one before it. I have to say Missouri Memories is the best novella collection I’ve read to date, and I give it a very high recommendation.

Reviewed by Ane Mulligan

http://www.anemulligan.com

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