Reviewing vs. Purchasing Books

By Kelly Bridgewater

If you read my last post, I talked about how paperback books are not really being offered for reviewers anymore.

When I started reviewing books in 2014, there were not that many book reviewers doing book reviews on personal blogs and transferring them to Amazon, Goodreads, Christianbook, etc . . .

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Since then, everyone who reads a book has a blog and reviews books. Book publishing companies love this. Authors love this. Review sites love this.

But as a reviewer, it is hard to make a difference or have your review stand out when everyone who can read has an opinion. Whether good or bad.

Since the publishing companies are pushing to go completely e-books through Netgalley, I wonder if it is better to just pre-order the books through Baker Book House, which offers 40% the Bethany House and Revell books and FREE shipping.

If I do this, then if I am rushed or busy with life, I won’t feel obligated to write a review.

Not that I don’t like to help out authors. I have done TONS in the past 10.5 years.

But I enjoyed getting compensated with a physical book for my time. Then if I wanted to keep the book, it went on my shelf. If not, then I donated it to our church library or pass it along to friends who I know would like it.

What about you? Review books or just purchase them. What benefits the authors more? This is the whole reason I reviewed anyways.

Michelle Shocklee: All We Thought We Knew

 By Kelly Bridgewater

She was so sure she knew her family’s story . . . Now she wonders if she was wrong about all of it.

1969. When Mattie Taylor’s twin brother was killed in Vietnam, she lost her best friend and the only person who really understood her. Now, news that her mother is dying sends Mattie back home, despite blaming her father for Mark’s death. Mama’s last wish is that Mattie would read some old letters stored in a trunk, from people Mattie doesn’t even know. Mama insists they hold the answers Mattie is looking for.

1942. Ava Delaney is picking up the pieces of her life following her husband’s death at Pearl Harbor. Living with her mother-in-law on a secluded farm in Tennessee is far different than the life Ava imagined when she married only a few short months ago. Desperate to get out of the house, Ava seeks work at a nearby military base, where she soon discovers the American government is housing Germans who they have classified as enemy aliens. As Ava works to process legal documents for the military, she crosses paths with Gunther Schneider, a German who is helping care for wounded soldiers. Ava questions why a man as gentle and kind as Gunther should be forced to live in the internment camp, and as they become friends, her sense of the injustice grows . . . as do her feelings for him. Faced with the possibility of losing Gunther, Ava must choose whether loving someone deemed the enemy is a risk worth taking, even if it means being ostracized by all those around her.

In the midst of pain and loss two women must come face-to-face with their own assumptions about what they thought they knew about themselves and others. What they discover will lead to a far greater appreciation of their own legacies and the love of those dearest to them.

 

My Thoughts:

All We Thought We Knew by Michelle Shocklee combines the world of World War II and the Vietnam war. This is definitely a unique and different perspective. I have not read many stories about the Vietnam war. My uncles do not like to talk about it, so I know they do not want to share the horrors that they had to endure. I know this was the Hippie era where there were many protests across America and college campus. But other than that, I really did not know much about this time period. I would have liked to see more of a justification for Mattie not wanting her brother and friend, Nash, to join the Marines to go fight in Vietnam. It was covered, but slightly. I wanted a little more depth to this aspect of the novel. This is a timeslip novel, so there is two time periods that depend on each other in order to solve the mystery by the end of the story. A little bit of romance in both periods. A horse farm as the setting and a camp in other. Shocklee does a wonderful job at bringing the settings to my imagination. Overall, All We Thought We Knew by Michelle Shocklee ventures into the Vietnam War Era and ties a thread to the World War II era. From heroic characters to characters with doubts, Shocklee invites readers into a world of questioning why readers believe what they believe. It is okay to dive deeper to cement pre-conceived ideas.

I received a complimentary copy of All We Thought We Knew by Michelle Shocklee from  Tyndale Publishing, but the opinions stated are all my own.

My Rating:  3.5 out of 5 stars

Purchase All We Thought We Knew