The Book Worm Returns!!

Even as a very young girl, I loved to read. ALWAYS had my nose in a book! My mom dreaded when I would start a new one, especially if it was more than 200 pages. She would affectionately say that I would be "worthless to help around the house" until it was finished! When I was in high school, I volunteered to work in the library during my study hall, that way I had first dibs on any new books that came. And I was the one who hid a paper back inside my World Geography book during class, pretending to be completely engrossed in tiny little Djbouti on the continent of Africa. I would rather read than eat or sleep!

As I grew older, my love for reading didn't really leave, but having TIME for it came and went depending on what was going on in my life. Didn't read much for fun during nursing school, no time for that! And in recent years, motherhood has become the real-life adventure to replace the ones I'd only read about before!

But over a decade ago, a very dear friend introduced me to a wonderful Christian author named Francine Rivers. Her books are the "can't put 'em down" kind that just draw you in, and you go crazy waiting to get your hands on the next one in a series. She always has such powerful messages, and an almost tangible sincerity that you feel HAD to have come from her own life's experiences.

A few weeks ago I was chatting with a friend from work, who I affectionately call "mom". Kim is a wise mother who reminds me alot of my own, and always has plenty of hugs and smiles for me when she sees I'm feeling a tad homesick! We were talking about motherhood and our kids, and she said, "Hey, have you ever heard of this author? I bet you'd really like her books..." She pulled out a Francine Rivers book, and I got all excited and gasped delightedly at the wonder that we shared something else in common!

Turns out that Kim actually KNOWS Mrs. Rivers, and they are friends! Little did I know that Francine and her family settled in northern California, a few miles from here actually - what a small world! I felt like I knew a celebrity!

She promised to give me the book to read after she was done, and sure enough, I got my hands on it a few days later! Turns out the perfect time to read it was Easter weekend, with all our cold rainy weather... I gobbled up that 500 page book like an old pro!

And cried through most of it.....

What a precious book! The kind that stays with you for a long time, that you actually LEARN something from. I highly recommend it, especially for any mothers of daughters... You will be blessed!

Now if I can only manage to wait till the sequel comes out this fall!!