Where Faith and Books Meet: Becky Wade: A Love Like Ours

By Kelly Bridgewater

Back Cover Copy:

Former Marine Jake Porter has far deeper scars than the one that marks his face. He struggles with symptoms of PTSD, lives a solitary life, and avoids relationships.

When Lyndie James, Jake's childhood best friend, lands back in Holley, Texas, Jake cautiously hires her to exercise his Thoroughbreds. Lyndie is tender-hearted, fiercely determined, and afraid of nothing, just like she was as a child. Jake pairs her with Silver Leaf, a horse full of promise but lacking in results, hoping she can solve the mystery of the stallion's reluctance to run.

Though Jake and Lyndie have grown into very different adults, the bond that existed during their childhood still ties them together. Against Jake's will, Lyndie's sparkling, optimistic personality begins to tear down the walls he's built around his heart. A glimmer of the hope he'd thought he'd lost returns, but fears and regrets still plague him. Will Jake ever be able to love Lyndie like she deserves, or is his heart too shattered to mend?

My Review:

I personally met Becky Wade at the 2014 ACFW conference in St. Louis. What a truly nice and approachable lady. She wrapped me in a hug and listened intently to everything I had to say. So when I found out she was writing another book in her Porter family series, I couldn’t wait to read it.

Wade’s writing is excellent. I feel like I’m right there with the characters, dealing with their personal struggles, thoughts and dilemmas. She does a great job at inviting her readers into the characters internally. The story is grammatical sound with an even amount of prose and dialogue. No head hopping between characters. I always knew which character I was following and never got lost once in the story.

Former Marine Jake Porter is my favorite character of A Love Like Ours. He suffers daily from PTSD and doesn’t spend a lot of time with people. The only relationship he thinks about is the relationship with Lyndie, his former friend. But Jake believes he allowed his former Marinemates down, so he hides from everyone. The continuing transformation in Jake was nice to watch, and Wade has proven her research into PTSD and made it come alive in Jake’s character.

As for Lyndie, I really enjoyed her love and compassion for her family, Jake, and her horses. Lyndie never gives up hope in any of them and is a truly wonderful woman of God. She has such a passion to see the better in everyone, including Jake. I liked her as a heroine.

My only gripe with the story was the pace of the story. The prologue that shows Jake and Lyndie as little kids grips me instantly and draws me into the adult relationship between the two. But for this suspense loving person who loves action in her story, the story dragged a lot in the middle. I kept skimming pages and flipping forward, and I never really missed anything that happened in the plot.

In short, Becky Wade’s newest book, A Love Like Ours has a hero that I loved spending more time with after reading her preceding two books in the Porter family series. I loved Wade’s writing, but the pace dragged in the middle for me. Fans of Beth K. Vogt, Janice Thompson, Katie Ganshert, and Melissa Tagg would devour this book.

I received a complimentary copy from Bethany House and all opinions are mine.

Becky Wade’s Writing Bio:

During her childhood in California, Becky frequently produced homemade plays starring her sisters, friends, and cousins. These plays almost always featured a heroine, a prince, and a love story with a happy ending. She's been a fan of all things romantic ever since.

Becky and her husband lived overseas in the Caribbean and Australia before settling in Dallas, Texas. It was during her years abroad that Becky's passion for reading turned into a passion for writing. She published three historical romances with Avon Books, then put her career on hold for several years to care for her kids, then recently returned to writing sheerly for the love of it. She felt led to move to the genre of contemporary Christian romance and couldn't be more thrilled with it.

These days Becky can be found failing but trying to keep up with her housework, sweating at the gym, carting her kids around town, playing tennis, hunched over her computer, eating chocolate, or collapsed on the sofa watching TV with her husband.