Book Review: The River Girl's Song by Angela Castillo

A Lovely Story

I listened to The River Girl's Song as an audiobook, and I think I would have enjoyed it more if I'd actually read it. The audiobook felt very slow—I'm a fast reader, and could have read it much faster than it was being narrated. The narration was clear, although there were a couple of words I had trouble picking up because of her accent (which Americans probably wouldn't even notice, but I'm from New Zealand).

But the story was lovely. Zillia Bright is orphaned at the age of sixteen, and left to care for her newborn baby brother. Her stepfather leaves the two of them alone on the farm, taking with him everything of value, leaving Zillia to struggle with the farm, and with raising her brother.

She has the help and support of her some of her neighbours, especially Soonie and Wylder, the half-Comanche sister and brother who live on the next farm over. As well as befriending and helping her, they show God's love, and teach her that God will listen to the her song and answer her prayers.

A sweet Christian romance with a real feel-good ending. And there is a (free on Kindle) sequel, which follows Soonie's story. I'm looking forward to reading it.

Thanks to Angela Castillo for providing a free audiobook for review. You can find out more about Angela at her website (http://angelacastillowrites.weebly.com/), and read the introduction to The River Girl's Song here:

Review: The Narrow Gate by David Bergsland

I 'read' The Narrow Gate as an audiobook, so this is a two-in-one review of both the content and the presentation.

The content was excellent. The Narrow Gate is examing the trend for the Christian church to be inclusive, to welcome everyone, and pointing out that it takes more than tithing and church attendance to be a Christian. His points are well-thought out and logical, and backed up by relevant Bible quotations. I found myself agreeing with everything he said (but also being worried by some of the churches he's attended over the years).

The Narrow Gate is easy to understand yet thought-provoking, one of those books I'm sure I'll get even more from the second time around.

But no matter how good the content, an audiobook flies or fails based on the narrator. I've heard narrators take award-winning novels and turn them into something less engaging than Old Testament geneologies, usually though a combination of monotone delivery and insufficient attention to punctuation.

Fortunately, this was not a problem with The Narrow Gate. The narrator had a voice which was easy to listen to and persuasive, an important factor given the material. The only problem with the audiobook version is the inability to highlight significant passages. No matter. I can always buy the book.

Recommended.

Thanks to the author for providing a free Audible book for review.

Reading Challenge: This Quiet Sky by Joanne Bischof

Reading Challenge: Book That Made Me Cry

I actually “read” the Audible audiobook, narrated by Gail Shalan. She had a beautiful voice with a youthful, breathy tone, which made it easy to believe she was a teenager from Rocky Knob, Virginia, in the mid-1880’s, especially as the book is written in first person present tense, and entirely from Sarah’s point of view.

There were a couple of words I didn’t understand because of her accent—I worked out pecan, but others remained a mystery (in case you were wondering, in New Zealand we put the emphasis on the first syllable, so it’s pea-kin, whereas she pronounced it pi-can with a very short p). However, the voice and accent were authentic and well-portrayed, and not understanding the odd word didn’t affect my enjoyment of the story at all.

This Quiet Sky is the story of Sarah Miller and Tucker O’Shea, the oldest students at the one-room school in Rocky Knob. Sarah is new in school and behind in algebra; Tucker is a math whiz who is asked to tutor her. A hesitant friendship develops, hesitant mostly on Sarah’s side because of the rumour that Tucker is dying from some unknown cause. Those who have read Bischof’s earlier Cadence of Grace series will recall Sarah Miller is Lonnie’s aunt.

That was my first surprise, and it wasn’t entirely welcome. I only read the first book in the Cadence of Grace trilogy, because I didn’t enjoy the characters or the plot (the setting and the writing were excellent, but that’s not enough to make me read a novel!). Also, first person present tense suggests contemporary Young Adult fiction to me, and the cover also made me think this was a contemporary novella. So the time setting was another surprise.

No matter. I found I liked Sarah a lot more than Lonnie, and Tucker reminded me of Augustus Waters from The Fault in Our Stars. Actually, there were a lot of similarities between This Quiet Sky and The Fault in Our Stars (thankfully, not the awful support group), but certainly in the theme and tone. Of course, This Quiet Sky is Christian fiction set in the 1800’s, which means Sarah and Tucker have a whole different set of challenges, but they also have the one thing Hazel and Gus didn’t have: faith.

And this faith aspect gives the novella a depth The Fault in Our Stars lacks, even in the much-shorter length. Recommended … but not if you’re in the mood for a light-hearted and relaxing read.

This story counts towards my 2015 Reading Challenge as a book which made me cry.

Audiobook Review and Giveaway: How A Star Falls by Amber Stokes

Something New …

This review is something new for Iola’s Christian Reads, because How a Star Falls isn't actually a read. It’s a listen: an audiobook, courtesy of Rivershore Books Book Tours and Amber Stokes.

I know a lot of people rave about audiobooks, but I’ve never seen the appeal. The audiobook that’s twelve hours of listening time is probably only four to six hours of reading time, and I’d rather read the book (especially when I can read it on my Kindle). But I’ve recently started a new job which involves two three-hour drives each week, so the idea of using audiobooks to help pass the time and reduce the monotony has a certain appeal. So I was pleased when I was invited to participate in this audiobook blog tour.

Apart from the time commitment, my other issue with audiobooks is the importance of the narrator. A good story can be ruined by bad or indifferent narration, something I have experienced with my previous ventures into audiobooks. Sometimes it’s narrators who try too hard to make their voices different for different characters, to the point where it’s off-putting. Other times it’s narrators whose voices are so monotone, I can’t tell the difference between the characters, which can make for confusing listening.

In the same way, a good narrator can make a story better. That was the case for me with How a Star Falls, narrated by Patrick Wilson Mahaney. Although it’s a romance, most of the novella is from Derek’s point of view, which made a male narrator the logical choice, and Mr Mahaney was excellent—clear and full of expression, with a slightly dreamy quality appropriate for a romance.

The other thing I particularly enjoyed was that How a Star Falls is a novella, so the entire recording is a little under two hours—something I could easily listen to while driving and finish all in one journey (and downloading from Audible onto my phone so I could listen was a breeze). I did notice one curious thing while I was listening: some words and phrases which might have annoyed me in the written book (like too many dialogue tags) worked just fine in an audiobook. I suspect this is a testament to the talent of the narrator.

But what did I think of the story?

Lovely.

Derek isn’t living the dream. He believed “them” when they said he’d have a better career and earn more if he went to college, so why is he now working a low-wage job as a sales clerk in a music store and paying off student loans? He’s musing about the injustice of it all while taking one of his favourite walks … where he comes across a woman in a wedding dress, sleeping on a bench at the top of the hill.

He wakes her because it’s about to get dark, and she says she’s a fallen star, from the edge of the constellation of Orion. Derek doesn’t exactly believe her, but it’s getting dark and she doesn’t have anywhere to go, so he does the gentlemanly thing and offers to take her home. Derek shows himself to be a nice guy who deserves more. Brielle (as he calls her) is naïve and imaginative, loves dancing, and helps Derek to reconsider how he thinks about his “career” and his family.

How a Star Falls is a gorgeous romance reminding us that we are responsible for our own choices, and that the life we are living doesn’t have to be the life we live. We can change things. And I liked and appreciated that reminder.

A lovely story that left me with a smile on my face even in rush-hour traffic.

You can find out more about Amber Stokes at her website, Seasons of Humility.

Giveaway!

Experience How a Star Falls as you’ve never heard it before! Enter to win one of three digital audiobook copies of the novella using the Rafflecopter form below. Open to anyone who can access Audible.com. (Prizes will be distributed using promo codes through that site.)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

There are also ebook and paperback versions available: Click here to go to Amazon