Together Forever by Jody Hedlund - Five Stars!

This book takes up where her older sister left off!  Marianne Neumann takes up a job placing orphans through the Children's Aid Society in 1858 New York. She does so in the hopes that she can find her sister Sophie who left the city and so that they can be reunited.  At the same time, she hopes that she can take these kids that have been left to their own devices, or have been given up by friends or relatives who can no longer care for them!  The Orphan Train takes the kids, Marianne and another placing agent who is so handsome and endearing with Marianne and the children through these cities to place the kids.  She finds that she is drawn to him and before the end she is caught up wanting to live her life with him, only to be caught up in a web of lies and deceit that almost becomes her undoing!  She and the other placing agent find themselves tackling problems from their secret past in the middle of their story and alst tackling their belief system and finding that God is there for them.  They have to love themselves before they can love anyone else.  The stories of the children are very real and endearing and I so enjoyed the ride. I believe I liked this book better than the second and that one was so good!  Well written and well researched!  This book was written on facts that existed from the journals of the past placing agents and was so very well thought out and planned. So very interesting!  Thank you to the author and to Bethany House for sharing this book with me and this is my very own thoughts on the book as I read it almost in the same day, I had to sleep a few hours. I couldn't put it down!  Thank you Jody Hedlund for this story and Bethany House!

Description as found on Good Reads: Determined to find her lost younger sister, Marianne Neumann takes a job as a placing agent with the Children's Aid Society in 1858 New York. She not only hopes to offer children a better life, but prays she'll be able to discover whether Sophie ended up leaving the city on an orphan train so they can finally be reunited.

Andrew Brady, her fellow agent on her first placing-out trip, is a former schoolteacher who has an easy way with children, firm but tender and friendly. Underneath his charm and handsome looks, though, seems to linger a grief that won't go away--and a secret from his past that he keeps hidden.

As the two team up, placing orphans in the small railroad towns of Illinois, they find themselves growing ever closer . . . until a shocking tragedy threatens to upend all their work and change one of their lives forever.

Monsterland Reanimated by Michael Okon! Five Stars...What a ride!

Well he did it again! What you ask? Michael got me to read a book I never in the wildest dreams would have picked up before and I read it from front to back in almost one sitting, I had to sleep a few hours and I so enjoyed the ride. Monsters Reanimated picked up where Monsterland left off. I did enjoy this teenage dystopian dream ride of a book. It had this wonderful group of teenagers picking up after a crazy man opened Monsterland and let all the Monsters out on the world. They have to go out and kill he rest of the Monsters remaining and there are some new ones, and then he even threw in a little teenage romance in there. Micheal always gets me to read story's I just think I would never have picked up and then I go and enjoy them. Way to go! The teens go out to save the world and conquer and the fight is realistic and well written you feel like you are in there with them trying to get away from the most awful goons in this book! Woo Hoo! I highly recommend this book if you like this sort of thing and even if you think you don't!
I am writing this review after receiving the book from the author and writing it of my own volition! I'm giving this one five stars! Pick it up you'll be glad you did!

The description of the book as found on Good Reads: After Monsterland has been destroyed, the entire world is thrown into chaos. Wyatt Baldwin and his friends must go beyond the boundaries of their small town to reestablish contact with the outside world. During their journey they discover a new threat released from the bowels of the defunct theme park. The danger of werewolves, vampires and zombies pale in comparison to an army of relentless mummies, Vincent Conrad’s reanimated monster and the menace of a life-sucking ooze they call The Glob. Will Wyatt and his friends survive when they reenter the scariest place on earth?