My Ever-Growing TBR Pile 8/24/2013

I decided to read this one because a friend of mine on Goodreads reviewed it on her blog a while back. It caught my interest and just so happened to be free this last weekend. It's on my Kindle now. Shanghai Love by Layne Wong. It promises a forbidden love affair and history.


Shanghai Love is a gripping novel about the unlikely love story that develops between a Chinese herbalist and a Jewish refugee in Shanghai during World War II. Peilin is betrothed to Kwan Yao, the only son of a wealthy pearl farmer. However, months before their wedding, Yao is killed by the Japanese in the Nanjing Massacre. The Kwans insist on proceeding with the wedding and beautiful Peilin is married to a ghost husband. When an uncle passes away, Peilin is sent to Shanghai to manage the Kwan family herbal shop. Meanwhile, in Berlin, Henri graduates from medical school just as Hitler rises to power and unleashes prejudice and violence against the Jewish population. He flees to Shanghai where he's befriended by Ping, a young disfigured rickshaw driver. Ping introduces Henri to his sister Peilin. Through her kindness, Henri becomes fascinated with Chinese herbs as well as the exotic culture surrounding him. Shanghai Love is a classic story of love's triumph over adversity.

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Spotted while doing a random search for woman pilots (I actually pulled up book four, but went digging to the previous titles), I found an Inspirational series featuring a woman pilot during WWII. This is book one, in which she first discovers her interest. A Matter of Trust (Engineers of Flight, Book One) is on my wishlist. I do believe the woman becomes an engineer--NOT an easy feat back then! OR a pilot. The author is Sherrilyn Polf.

Stanford University is out of reach for most Colorado teens in 1939. The opportunity to gain an education there is beyond nineteen-year-old Dena Caulter's wildest rural dreams. Yet Uncle Walter, a professor at the prestigious university, extends an open door to his home as well as the Howard Hughes Aeronautics program, and Dena is more than willing to spread her wings. Upon arriving in California, Dena feels her rustic roots showing but easily adapts to a more sophisticated lifestyle alongside her cousins, Emily and Stuart. Life may be offering opportunities and fun Dena never thought existed, but her nave world is about to get a huge dose of reality. Uncle Walter is chosen to work with Howard Hughes in Virginia as part of an elite, top secret team working on NACA technology, and the move threatens to break up the family with the mention of an unfathomable divorce.

Talk of war also breaks up the previously pleasant conversations and laughter that once provided the soundtrack for gatherings between Dena and friends. With opinions voiced, she worries that the boy she secretly has a crush on, Claywill, be whisked away before she gets the chance to truly know him. Even her beloved brother wants to join a war effort she has yet to understand. Studying blueprints no longer offers the intriguing escape it once held for Dena. Struggling to find balance in a life moving faster than one of Mr. Hughes' airplanes, Dena must hold on to the Christian values her mother always instilled in her youth, especially when the bright future of her friends and family begins to dim under the threat of war and A Matter of Trust.

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Also on my wishlist: Deadstick Dawn by S.L. Menear. Woman commercial airline pilot that gets herself involved in some risky business.

The Belfast Agreement is about to be shattered by Operation Blue Blood. One young American stands in the way, airline pilot Samantha Starr. She is catapulted into a deadly chess match with police, assassins, and British Special Forces, all who want her dead. The fate of nine noble bloodlines depends on Samantha and a boy whose hero is a wizard. Stranded in Scotland where she is accused of kidnapping and murder, where can she run? When a US Navy fighter pilot and a SEAL join the hunt and every choice can get her killed and start a bloody war in Northern Ireland, on whom should she rely? The line between trust and betrayal is razor sharp, and it is cut at Deadstick Dawn.

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Warrior Princess by Allan Frewin Jones is on its way to my mailbox, having been brought to my attention via Goodreads recommendations. I actually looked at them for a change. LOL


"You can be a warrior, if you choose to be."

It takes just a moment for fifteen-year-old Branwen's life to change forever. In the blink of an eye the Saxons attack and her brother is killed. Almost as quickly, she is sent away from her home to a neighboring stronghold where she'll be safe from harm. Now Branwen lives as a princess should--surrounded by exquisite things and lavish quarters. But deep down remains the soul of a warrior.

Just when Branwen is sure she has been pushed to her limits, a chance encounter with a mystical woman in white forces her to question everything--and everyone--around her. With no time to lose, Branwen must make a choice: continue in the path her parents intended for her . . . or step into the role of true Warrior Princess.

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Kindle freebie that caught my eye and made it on my Kindle: Long Way Home by Cheryl A. Head.

Two, young World War II enlistees-a boy who is a misfit in his own family and a farm girl in search of adventure--discover each other on a segregated military base in a remote Arizona desert. They are two of nearly one million black soldiers who believe their army experience during America’s largest global conflict will gain them their country’s respect and acceptance. But their battles and victories are found far away from the front lines of the war.

The blurb on Amazon is different: 

Georgette Lillian Newton has a predictable future. She will work on the family farm, marry her high school sweetheart and continue the tradition of raising kids and crops in rural North Carolina. But, she yearns to see the exciting places she reads about in Look magazine and infuriates her parents and boyfriend when she joins the exclusive U.S. Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps also known as the WAACS.

LeRoy Dowdell’s sensitive nature makes him a misfit in his family and his community. A brilliant musician, he longs to play in a big band like that of Tommy Dorsey or Duke Ellington. He lies about his age to enlist in the army and escape his disapproving father and the rumors of a small town. He hopes a soldier’s uniform will be his ticket to travel overseas where he can play music and find a place where he feels he belongs.

It is 1943 and America’s involvement in World War II is at its heights. The paths of these two young dreamers cross at Fort Huachuca a segregated army base near Tucson, Arizona where they fall in love, fight personal battles and complete their journeys of self discovery. Along the way they interact with an array of dynamic characters.

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Spotted on Edelweiss and on my wishlist: The Island of Doves by Kelly O'Connor McNees. 

Vivid and enthralling, Island of the Doves tells the story of a courageous woman who is desperate for freedom and of those who will risk everything to help her….

Susannah Fraser lives in one of Buffalo’s finest mansions, but her monstrous husband makes the home a terrible prison. When a local nun offers to help her escape, Susannah boards a steamship headed for Mackinac Island and a chance at freedom.

Magdelaine Fonteneau has seen her share of tragedy—a husband murdered before her eyes, two sisters lost—and she sees offering Susannah refuge in her island home as atonement for her many regrets. This act of kindness changes Susannah in ways she never could have imagined as she finds solace in the company of others who carry their own secrets and scars. Only together can they untangle their pasts—and find a future bright with the promise of new life.

The blurb on Edelweiss said woman  number two was also a fur trader.

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Spotted via Goodreads ad and on my wishlist: The Sleeping Dictionary by Sujata Massey.


In 1930, a great ocean wave blots out a Bengali village, leaving only one survivor, a young girl. As a maidservant in a British boarding school, Pom is renamed Sarah and discovers her gift for languages. Her private dreams almost die when she arrives in Kharagpur and is recruited into a secretive, decadent world. Eventually, she lands in Calcutta, renames herself Kamala, and creates a new life rich in books and friends. But although success and even love seem within reach, she remains trapped by what she is . . . and is not. As India struggles to throw off imperial rule, Kamala uses her hard-won skills—for secrecy, languages, and reading the unspoken gestures of those around her—to fight for her country’s freedom and her own happiness.

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Spotted on Harlequin Junkie--a blog I follow--and on my wishlist due to the aviation theme and woman pilot: Broken Wings, Soaring Hearts by Beverly A. Rogers.

Hailey Holman is a woman determined to keep her dad’s memory and his dream of reopening their small-town Texas base station alive. Jack Stinson is looking for a peaceful place to escape the rat race of the big city life and big city business of his own family’s airplane manufacturing business.

What a perfect match. Other than the fact that her mom hates the flying business with a passion and fights Hailey’s every effort, and Jack’s dad fought his every effort to make the break, then disowned him for leaving. Throw in two town bullies who insist on opening a base station of their own and reeking havoc on Hailey’s plans and her own determinatio not to get personally involved with the employees, and it’s anything but smooth sailing.

But these two focused pilots might just be surprised how things can work out with enough stubbornness … and faith.