"Roots & Sky" Book Review

Christie Purifoy takes you on a literary journey of deeply-rich images depicting a year in her life at her home at Maplehurst.

Not since reading "One Thousand Gifts" by Ann Voskamp have I encountered literary depiction on the same scale by a contemporary author. Purifoy uses her skill of the written word to paint wonderful "word pictures" in your mind. Full of descriptions of emotions, sights, and smells she makes the ordinary rather extraordinary with well-chosen words and non-rambling sentences weaving biblical scripture in a long the way.

Being a farm wife, I could relate to a lot of her life. The wonder of almost spring, the hot summer days, winter that seems to never end...she captures the excitement of simple life!

My only complaint is that her chapters are broken down into small "thoughts". Which, isn't necessarily a bad thing. But I often felt like she was going to make a point, then didn't. Then in the next thought when you thought she was moving on to something else, she revisits the previous thought again. I got a little frustrated wanting her to hurry "the point" along. But in retrospect, I find that if you would try and do that, you would lose that sweetness of what she is trying to get across. In truth though, she does eventually reach her point.

You will probably find yourself dog-earring pages to remember the simple but well-said things that were touching. This is one of those books you need to re-read and you will no doubt find special gems each time. But, its not a book to be read in a hurry, I sort of had to to reach this review deadline, and by doing so I think I may have done myself and the book an injustice. Purifoy is what I consider to be a "word smith". Read this like you would admire a piece of art: thoroughly and thoughtfully.

4.5 out of 5 stars.

(I was given this book for free by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.)

"The Prophetess" Book Review

"The Prophetess" is an in-depth fictional depiction of chapters 4 and 5 from the book of Judges in the Old Testament of the Bible.

Jill Eileen Smith had her work cut out for her to stretch these two chapters into a 300-plus page novel depicting the life and time of Deborah, a prophetess and judge of the Israelite people. There are characters that were actually real: Deborah, Lappidoth, Barak, Sisera, Jael. All mentioned in the story from Judges. However, Smith adds sons, daughters, daughter's in law, and friends to these real-life people to flesh them out even though they've been gone from us for centuries. True some "poetic license" occurs, but the main core to the biblical account is fairly solid.

The story line seemed a bit slow for me at first. But the middle half of the book moved well. I felt the ending was a bit slow as well.

Smith weaves suspense and some romance to the story line, which made me want to keep reading to see how things shook out between Talya and Barak. I already knew how the main story ended because of reading the biblical account. I guess part of me too wanted to see just how Smith was going to accomplish it all.

The names of some of the characters were a bit of a mouth full, but didn't detract from the overall story line.

I felt that Smith did her homework and definitely achieved making Deborah and her family and Israel's struggle real. If anything, I have a face in my mind's eye of who Deborah was. I don't think that what Smith accomplishes in this work was by any means easy. I applaud her efforts.

Overall, it wasn't my usual fare in books. Some of the wording felt a bit stilted and was sparse on description, but overall a good read. 4 out of 5 stars.

(I was given this book for free by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.)