I cannot sew.

The third and final (?) book in the Lassoed in Texas series came out recently. I had forgotten about it until I took a sojourn to my local Barnes and Noble and found it among the Christian fiction section. Another story of a girl who escapes an evil foster dad with her adopted sister and winds up in Sour Springs, Texas. She and her sister are split by Grant (No Last Name) who adopts all of the children who are left on the orphan train (Sour Springs is the last stop). Hannah Cartwright reluctantly allows Grant to take her sister by pretending she is a stranger. However, she is very reluctant after she finds out that he has more adopted children at home and suspects that he may be like her foster father, who made her and all of her sisters work in a carpet mill and beat them physically, mentally, and emotionally at every turn.

Hannah and Grant are thrown together yet again when Hannah announces that she is the town's new schoolmarm and will be teaching all of Grant's "children". He is very reluctant to allow them to go to school, because of the stigma that comes with being an orphan and the other parents who don't understand that they have nothing to fear from these less-than-fortunate children. Hannah tries her hardest to find faults in Grant's parenting style, but can find none. All of the children are loved and given a roof, clothes, and food to live. Grant goes without if it means that one of his children will have new clothes or food. After Grant finds out that Hannah is also an orphan, she endears herself to him forever. And so another love story is written... however... the author, Mary Connealy, tries to incorporate the characters from the last story, Calico Canyon, without much success. It seems to rushed and most of the time I don't understand why it is part of the story at all other than Hannah and Grace are foster sisters. When they reunited at the end of the story, Connealy reveals no true bonding time between the women. Daniel, Grace's husband, is still as naive as ever as to why God allows women to be pregnant and helps Grant as to how to have a "real" marriage. Overall the book is good. Very good dialogue..and narrative. However, the ending seems very rushed and I would not have minded it being longer if more time was needed between Hannah and Grace and then Hannah and Grant.

Oh yeah, I also read (well, skimmed) Lauren Willig's new book, The Temptation of the Night Jasmine. I didn't believe the bad reviews and well I should have, sadly. The story between Eloise and Colin that started "heating up" in the last disappointment...I mean book, fell really, really short. After only one month of "dating" Eloise and Colin had NO spark. They talked very seldom as she was searching for more information for her research and he was holed up in his study. After Eloise eavesdrops in the loo of a pub, she mistakenly thinks that Colin is a spy and tries her hardest to find out everything. This is kind of boring. I don't want intrigue in this part of the story. In the story of Charlotte and what's his face, it's starts really strong and he hurts Charlotte after leading her down the road to courtship. The passion that is written in the first three books of Willig's is not displayed in this book... VERY SAD AND DISAPPOINTING.

I don't think I have anything else to say about that. One of my friends told me about a couple of new books, so I may looking into reading some of those. Maybe new post of one tomorrow?