Tag Archive for Review

Alienation

Posted by Bobbie Gould on January 26, 2012
in Books

By RJ

I’m a huge fan of anything action related. While I love a good classic book like Anne of Green Gables, I’m also a huge tom-boy and I love action books and sci-fi. I had a chance to review Alienation by John  S. Lewis and let me just say that this book is amazing.

Alienation is a book about Colt McAlister and his two friends Oz and Danielle. All that Colt wants to do is have a normal life. Without aliens, mutants, and danger. He wants his parents alive and he doesn’t want to attend the CHAOS military academy.

But when someone is out to get him and take over the world will Colt step it up and take responsibility for what he has to do? Or will he just run away?

Can I just say that this book was AMAZING?????? This book is SO awesome! I can’t get over how much I enjoyed this book.  Even my younger teenage sister enjoyed it. (Then again, she loves any books!)

I’m generally pretty picky about my sci-fi books. The story has to be easy to follow and it can’t be too sci-fi or else I don’t like it. But this book was such a great book! It was easy to follow and is a pretty easy read. I felt like I was right there with Colt, Oz, and Danielle.

I really connected with Colt in this book. I think that the author did such a great job with this book. Teens will easily connect and sympathize with Colt. They will also enjoy the adventures that he encounters along the way.

Even kids that don’t like to read will love this book. Especially boys. But I know that teenage girls will enjoy this book too. Its action packed, suspenseful, funny, and dramatic. It’s a great story with a powerful message that any teen will enjoy.

You can find this book in stores on January 3rd, 2012. Be sure to pick it up online or at your local bookstore.

Jon Lewis Alienation Giveaway

Enter 1/19 – 2/7. RSVP for Party today!


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The Keeper: A Revell Blog Tour

Posted by html404 on January 14, 2012
in Books

As you may have noticed, life is busy here in our home and reading is something that I do just to relax and zone out. It helps me take a break from all the things pressing for my attention and allows me to escape only to have a better focus on what needs to be done.  I certainly have more time to read during the colder months of the year than I do during the warmer months, as is evidenced by an almost weekly supply of book reviews lately! 😉

This next book review is by an author I have come to love. I get excited when I see Suzanne Woods Fisher’s name on an upcoming blog tour list! It is a contemporary romance but what I like about Suzanne’s books is the relationships and life lessons God is teaching her characters. There is always something for everyone in her books. Whether you are grieving, holding on to something that it has become an idol or plain need to slow down and take it easy The Keeper will teach you something.

I loved the Lapp’s family dynamics. Their love and care for one another is as it should be within a family unit. I loved how the character Fern seemed to know just how to bring out the best in each of the family members. I loved the sweetness and innocence of Menno, may we all have child-like faith and love like his.

I grappled with the heart transplant issue as I have never really come to a decision on what I believe about it. And I truly wonder what the Amish think about it all. I know all the finer points and the benefits of organ donors and transplants, but there is a fine line there in harvesting them and truly knowing the heart of God in a matter like this one. This is a whole can of worms, I know, but I am just being honest here.

Suzanne had me laughing and thoroughly amused through most of the book. Then towards the end I was crying. My oldest said, “You always cry in her books.” I snapped, “You would too if…….” Sorry I didn’t want to reveal a spoiler! You’ll just have to read the book yourself.

Two thumbs up from me!

“Available January 2012 at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.”

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive free products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


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That’s My Girl: A Revell Blog Tour

Posted by html404 on January 7, 2012
in Books, Family Stuff, Parenting

That’s My Girl is a book written parenting expert Rick Johnson, founder of “Better Dads”. This book maps out how dads can develop a healthy, closer relationship with their daughters, and gives moms insight into the important role a father plays in the life of their girls, including her relationship to her father.

The father-daughter relationship is very important in a girls life. According to Mr. Johnson, this is the one relationship that determines how she feels about herself, what kinds of men she is attracted to and how she expects to be treated by other men. I know as I read the pages of this book, I couldn’t help thinking about my relationship with my Dad, who passed away 6 years ago. He was a good provider, active in our lives as little girls (I have 3 younger sisters) but once we hit preteen and teen years he became much more distant.

I agreed with some of the things Mr. Johnson shared, but other things I didn’t. There are always exceptions to the rule and there is the God factor. I believe certain areas of my life could have been disastrous, were not because of God having my back so to speak. I loved the stories he shared about his teenager daughter. She was a character!

Mr. Johnson does a thorough job of showing Dads how to help map their daughters future. Overall I believe this book is a good resource for fathers especially, but mothers will benefit as well.

“Available January 2012 at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.”

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive free products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


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Cheap Tee’s Review

Posted by html404 on December 15, 2011
in Clothing

CheapTees is a company that sells the best quality cheap tees on the web. They are a family owned and operated company. They hope that their low prices and excellent customer service will win your business and keep you coming back.

They sell Short Sleeve T-Shirts, Polo Shirts, Sweatshirts, Fleece, Outerwear, Long Sleeve T-Shirts, Junior Tees & Sweats, Youth, Infant and Toddler T-Shirts, Pocket T-Shirts, Tank Tops, Organic & Eco-Friendly T-Shirts, Dress Shirts, Socks, Hats, Sweatpants, and Yoga Pants. CheapesTees even offers Screen Printing & Embroidery to their customers.

They also offer free shipping on orders of $69 or more, and offer free returns. Visit CheapesTees.com to check out their wide selection of clothing of awesome clothing.

They sent me a awesome t-shirt to review and I really love it. It’s made of organic cotton, very soft and it fits me really well. I’m very happy with how it washes up and how well made it is. For $3.98 (regular $12.00) you are getting a great quality tee.

I would definitely purchase from CheapesTees again in the future. They are a great company with good products. CheapesTees.com

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive free products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


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Sweet Leaf Tea Review

Posted by html404 on December 14, 2011
in All Natural Products, Food and Treats, Health and Nutrition, Organic

I was contacted by a company called Sweet Leaf Tea (www.sweetleaftea.com) that offers tasty organic, all-natural iced tea beverages. They sent me some of their products to review and we love this tea because it’s all natural. We try to stay away from sugary juices, sodas, and beverages. It’s very rare that we drink any of them, so I am always looking for natural alternatives.

This tea is really good! My kids love it and I was honestly surprised that they drank it because usually they aren’t crazy about iced tea. Personally, I really liked the lemon tea. It was really good and refreshing. I wasn’t crazy about the peach, but then again I don’t like peach anyways! 🙂

With twelve different flavors you are sure to find one that you love! We love that this tastes so yummy and yet it’s 100% all natural and organic.

Original
Diet Original
Half and Half
Citrus
Diet Citrus
Lemonade
Lemon-Lime
Lemon Tea
Peach
Diet Peach
Raspberry
Honey-Mint

Fun tip- Sweet Leaf Tea is currently hosting a cool promotion/website called Granny’s Almanac www.sweetleafalmanac.com, which offers visitors to the website a variety of sweet coupons and deals daily.

For more information or to purchase this tea please visit- www.sweetleaftea.com

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive free products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


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Pine Bros. Softish Throat Drops Review

Posted by Brande on December 10, 2011
in All Natural Products, Food and Treats, Products for Dad, Products for Mom

This history of this product is fascinating.  It started in 1870 and sold to The Life Savers Company in 1930.  It was resold a number of times and due to cost cuts the product recipe had been altered.  Then the creator of Airborne, Victoria Knight-McDowell acquired Pine Bros. Softish Throat Drops and brought the product back to natural products.

Pine Bros. Softish Throat Drops are available this fall!  Currently, Natural Honey and Wild Cherry are out.  Lemon-Citrus & Licorice are coming soon!

Check online for availability at a local store or you can order them online!

My Review:

I received 2 ” pucks”, Natural Honey & Wild Cherry.  First of all,  I love the fact this is a natural product.  It’s not as squishy as a Gummy Bear but not hard like a hard cough drop.  It’s in between with a desirable texture.  I enjoyed both, if I had to pick one.  I like the Wild Cherry a little better than Natural Honey.

They were good. However, I didn’t have a soar throat when I tried them. They have a smooth feeling down your throat so, I would assume they would work.

Overall, a great product!

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive free products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


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The Mirror of N’de & $50 Amazon Gift Card Giveaway: A Litfuse Blog Tour

Posted by html404 on December 1, 2011
in Books

First, I have to admit that I did not read this book. My second oldest daughter did. Here is her review:

The Mirror of N’de is written by L.K.Malone. It is an allegory about young girl named Hadley Mivana and her journey to find a way to help her persecuted people, the Ramash, from the cruel rulers, the Oresed.

The book starts with strange dreams with a wonderful Being, representing Jesus. In the dreams are strange riddles. They are based on a forbidden tale about how their ancestors were banished from the Glorious city of N’de. There is are strange twists and turns that kept me glued to the book, but then again I am always glued to a book! 😉

After three life changing events come to pass Hadley begins to understand her strange dreams. One of those events is when the Emperor and his son return and change their city…and I was very surprised at the outcome, I was not expecting it!

What I got from the book is to love your enemy no matter what and to stand up for what you believe in even if others are against you. This is often hard, but it takes more character and strength to stand up for your principles than it does to back down from them. I can only hope that I will be strong like that.

I really like allegories, so I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It was thrilling and very interesting to read about a mysteriously forbidden bedtime story coming to life!

Visit Litfuse here.

A Giveaway!

To be entered to win a $50 gift card to Amazon.com all you have to do is send a tweet (using @litfuse) about The Mirror of N’de or share about it on Facebook! That’s it!

If you tweet Litfuse will capture your entry when you use @litfuse. If you share it on Facebook or your blog, just email let the Litfuse gals know (ckrumm [at] litfusegroup.com with no spaces)

Not sure what to tweet/post? Here’s an idea:

TWEET THIS: New YA fantasy – The Mirror of N’de – compelling narrative and creative characters! @litfuse RT for $50 to @amazon http://ow.ly/7AWGT

FACEBOOK THIS: Don’t miss this debut YA fantasy story: Crafting powerful narrative and creative characters, author L. K. Malone spins a compelling tale that combines exciting entertainment and the Christian story. In The Mirror of N’de, readers will empathize with the desires of an oppressed people, will anger at the affliction of a cruel adversary, and ultimately rejoice with the revelation of a Savior. Share this for a chance at $50 to Amazon.com http://litfusegroup.com/blogtours/text/13440685

Link to buy the book: http://www.amazon.com/dp/0825426677/ref=as_li_ss_til?tag=sprightly-20&camp=0&creative=0&linkCode=as4&creativeASIN=0825426677&adid=19YT611JVE91SRJZHKF3

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive free products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


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Remembering Christmas – A Revell Blog Tour

Posted by html404 on November 19, 2011
in Books, Holidays

It is hard to believe we are nearly through the month of November. We have had a beautiful fall here in Chicagoland. Now the holidays are upon us. First Thanksgiving next week and then Christmas within a month. Our family loves the Christmas season and Christmas stories. Remembering Christmas by Dan Walsh is one of those books that is all about family and what it means to be a part of one. It is a book to be read over and over again as a reminder of being a devoted son or daughter.

Remembering Christmas is not your typical, predictable romance. It does contain a few well placed twists and turns. What I liked about it is that a wealthy, successful, yet selfish son, Rick, comes back to his hometown during his mother’s time of need. He begrudgingly puts all his needs and wants on the back burner to be there for her. I admire his devotion to his mother.

I also liked that Rick’s trip home forced him to face his old hurts and repair broken relationships that should never have been broken in the first place. It is through the healing process he finds unexpected love and devotion of another kind.

This is a lovely story about relationships. Everyone could learn something from this book. It gets a two thumbs up from me!

“Available September 2011 at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.”

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive free products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


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HOTPANTS (TM), Not Hot Pads

Posted by html404 on November 18, 2011
in Clothing, Health and Nutrition

When I first signed up for the HOTPANTS (TM) review, I thought it was just another tummy tucker. Do you know what I mean when I say that? I just thought it was an article of clothing that tucked in all your excess baby weight. But I was mistaken. It is much more than that. It is a pair of biker shorts that was invented to sweat off the cellulite and excess fat in your waist, hips, butt and thighs. Inside the packaging is a flyer “Take the Two Week Challenge” encouraging you to weigh and measure yourself, wear the Hotpants every day for 2 weeks, then weigh and measure yourself again. After doing that share your results on Facebook and tweet about it.


My Results

Since I have only had my Hotpants for over a week and since they are required to line dry I have not been able to wear them every day for two weeks because it took them a couple of days to dry in our house. Plus I wasn’t wearing them to meetings outside our home because one they are not dressy enough and two it has been pretty chilly this week with the wind even with temps in the 50s at the beginning of this week. All that to say I have not seen any results due to my lack of consistency in wearing them.

My Thoughts about Hotpants

However, what I can say about the Hotpants is that they are warm, comfortable and fun to wear. My husband teases me saying I won’t be able to sneak up on anyone in them because they make a distinct “swishing” sound when I walk. Ha!

The Hotpants are black on the outside and yellow on the inside, elastic waistband and have a fair amount of give to them.

They fit surprisingly well. Being on the short side they fall at or just below the knee depending if I am standing or sitting. On taller folks they should fit like normal biker shorts like the photo to the left.

The Technology Behind Hotpants

Hotpants are engineered using Celu-Lite (TM) technology. They use your natural body heat to reduce the fat and visible cellulite. By wearing Hotpants you increase your perspiration by up to 80%. The Celu-Lite (TM) technology heats the body areas covered by Hotpants, promote deeper warming of your tissue leading to more sweating and thus breaking down fat and toxins which then can reduce the fat and visible cellulite. Cool, eh?

The technology behind Hotpants is called bio-ceramics, which has been around since the 70s. The bio-ceramics contained inside the material of the Hotpants, and contain far-infrared reflective particles, enabling the reflection of the body generated heat back into the tissue, warming up the tissue deep below the skin’s surface. (Reworded from this resource: Zaggora’s Hotpants product information sheet)

You can wear Hotpants during your workouts, working around your house or even sleep in them! Studies have shown that just wearing them to bed can lead to positive results in a 6-8 week time frame! Yes, I have been wearing them to bed too. 😉

Where to Buy

Overall, I really like them and look forward to having more time to see what kind of results I get.

Want some too? You can buy your own pair of Hotpants at Zaggora.com. They retail for about $71 US.


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The Christmas Shoppe – A Revell Blog Tour

Posted by html404 on November 12, 2011
in Books

Our family loves the Christmas season, which will be upon us in just a couple of weeks. Melody Carlson has written a timely novel, The Christmas Shoppe.

The bookworms on your gift list will enjoy this refreshing, heartwarming story with a sprinkle of romance. It is a light, easy read. Definitely a book to read to “get away from it all” if a vacation is not on the horizon.

If you believe in Christmas angels then this book is for you! Matilda is a character in The Christmas Shoppe. She is an eccentric woman with some very unselfish goals as she sowed seeds of love, healing and happiness out over the people living in the town of Parrish.

I loved the story’s message, which from my perspective seems three-fold:

1. Remember the true meaning of Christmas.
2. Don’t allow old wounds to ruin your present and future life.
3. Allow love to conquer all.

The Christmas Shoppe receives two thumbs up for me! I am even letting my daughters read this one! 🙂 Oh and I did not shed one tear…..amazing, I know!

“Available September 2011 at your favorite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group.”

Faith and Family Reviews received the following product in exchange for writing a review. While we consider it a privilege to receive free products to review, our reviews are our honest opinion and thoughts of the product.


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